


Les amis de la Saint-Denis - Book one - My name is Marius Pontemercy

by Christine_Enjolras



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: F/M, M/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-09-18
Updated: 2017-01-15
Packaged: 2018-08-15 20:18:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 17
Words: 48,830
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8071291
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Christine_Enjolras/pseuds/Christine_Enjolras
Summary: Marius Pontemrcy, who's sixteen, has lost his father since three months and his mathernal grandfather, his tutor, decided to enroll him to a private high school in Saint-Denis, north of Paris. Marius, in addition to overcoming the grief, have to change everything: house, school, friends... Even the way, things could go better that they seem. He'll meet at the students' resident, where his grandfather rent a room for him from Thènardiers, a strange group of friends that will become for him something like a funny, sweet family."Les amis de la saint-Denis" uses the most important events in Les misérables's novel and musical in contemporary era, during a school year. This is a long fanfiction divided in five books, with almost four chapter, that are divided into a lot of paragraphs writing in G.R.R. Martin style, so you'll can read the story through twelve different points of views. This is the first book of five, which are dedicated to fanfiction's character, and it's mainly a characters' introduction, but it cointains some events which will be important for the next ones.





	1. First day at Saint-Denis - Marius

**_Marius_ **

Although he was still sitting in the car, his heart was beating wildly in his chest; his shaking hands were nervously clutching as little fabric as he could grasp from the tight trousers he was wearing, and a little drop of sweat started to fall on his freckle-dusted face. How to blame young Marius? His mother dead, Marius had always lived with his father as a common boy, attending a public school like many other boys. But now, after his father had left him because of the AIDS, he lived with his grandfather, Monsieur Gillenormand, who had decided to sign Marius up for the private college Saint Denis de Paris, so that his grandson could benefit from the best education available.

Marius heard his grandfather mutter something, but didn’t answer: he was too focused on trying not to be breathless out of nervousness to realize that someone was speaking to him. “Marius… Marius!”

At that point, he drew his absent-minded gaze away from the view, as if he had suddenly snapped awake from a dream. “Uh? What? S-sorry, grandfather… Did you say something?”

Marius knew that Monsieur Gillenormand really wasn’t used to dealing with young people anymore, and he couldn’t blame him, since he hadn’t been in touch with his daughters for years. Marius hadn’t met the eldest, his aunt, yet, while the youngest, his mother, had passed away after giving birth to him – at least that was what he was told. With his grandson, though, it was different: in spite of the fact that he often got angry with him, every time he looked into his eyes and he couldn’t help softening. Therefore, he would take a deep breath and calm himself – Marius knew this well. And so he did: he stared into the boy’s eyes for some moments, then he sunk into the seat behind the chauffeur, he closed his eyes, took a deep breath and, once calm, he said: “I was asking what’s the matter with you. You look quite nervous.”

Marius would always feel guilty for seeing his grandfather react like that, maybe because he didn’t know him well and he couldn’t see what he had done wrong; realizing he was sweating in the new clothes his grandfather had bought him, he wiped his forehead, shaking, and, smiling, he answered: “Well, maybe I am a little… this is all new for me… different… I don’t know what to expect from this school…”

“Everything is going to be fine, Marius: it’s a school like the others, no different from the one you used to attend.”

“The only difference being, in this school, I’m going to study with rich trust fund babies who most certainly have their noses in the air!” Marius almost whispered, looking out of the window: he pretended he didn’t want to be heard, even if those words had come out of his mouth precisely because he wanted his grandfather to be aware of his discomfort. He’d actually heard Marius: “I should have imagined it: you miss your old schoolmates, don’t you?”

Marius was taken aback by the fact that his grandfather had heard him, although that was what he wanted, and he was even more taken aback by that old man, whom he had considered strict and grouchy, and who was now looking at him with a very sweet gaze, full of hurt.

“I suppose you’ve considered… cruel of me, forcing you to change school like that, all of a sudden. I hope you understand I did this only for you, because I care about your education. Don’t think of me like your rich, evil grandfather, taking you away from your friends because he thinks that the vulgar, common, public school you’re attending isn’t suitable for his good name. Believe me, I do this only for your future: the Saint Denis private school is one of the best in the nation, it can open a lot of doors for you.” Probably old Gillenormand saw that his grandson wasn’t convinced yet, because after some moments of silence he added, “Now you think so because you’re saddened and frightened by the idea of starting everything over, but you’ll see: you’ll be fine here, I can assure you that!”

They spent the rest of the travel without even speaking a word. Monsieur Gillenormand talked about everything and anything with the chauffeur to spend the long travel dividing their mansion, south of Paris, from the village of Saint-Denis, north of the capital. Although the chauffeur himself tried from time to time to engage Marius in the conversation, the boy didn’t say anything: his big green eyes seemed to look at the wonderful Parisian view over the Seine, but actually they were lost in who knows what thoughts. Suddenly, however, Marius seemed to wake up from his reflections when he saw a towering church built in light-coloured stone, and he recognized it as Saint Denis. “Here we are, boy.”

The school had to be the great building in front of the abbey complex: from the car window, Marius could see many people – students, teachers, churchmen – going through a gate between the church and the majestic and certainly ancient building. Whether he liked it or not, he too would have been attending that school for the next three years. His grandfather’s limousine halted in the parking lot next to the square, where an old short churchman wearing a cassock seemed to have been waiting just for their arrival. The chauffeur got off the car and opened the back door to let grandfather and grandson get off in turn.

“Good day, monsieur Gillenormand. I was wondering when you’d have arrived. And I guess this young man must be your grandson, our new student. Monsieur Marius Pontmercy, do I remember well?”

“Good day to you, monseigneur Myriel. I’m sorry for having kept you waiting, there’s been much traffic while coming here. Yes, this is my grandson, Marius.”

“Good day, monseigneur.” Marius was confused: why an old, probably retired bishop had been waiting for them?

“My dear boy, from this day on, I’ll be your headmaster!” He had a nice, welcoming and reassuring smile, this monseigneur Myriel, framed by two considerable snow-white sideburns. And yet, Marius couldn’t believe it: he was about to attend a private school, full to the brim with trust fund babies, and to top it all off, it was also headed by a bishop! What would he have discovered next? That in this college religion was a mandatory subject even for him, a law student? He felt despair for having come to such a place grow exponentially within himself.

“Don’t pull that face, son”, said monseigneur Myriel, putting his hands on Marius’s shoulders. “How about a tour of the building? Classes are going to begin soon and there are still a lot of things I have to show you. Monsieur, if you please, we shall go.”

“Not to worry, monseigneur. We’ll head home.” The old grandfather spoke privately to Marius one last time. “I’m taking your luggage to the residence where you’re staying, alright? Being there, you’ll be able to make new friends and you won’t have to cross the whole city to come here every morning.” Marius had already heard him tell him that, but at that moment he was too sad to repeat to his grandfather that he had understood very well already. Monsieur Gillenormand looked at him straight into his eyes again, he scratched his white beard as if he were thinking of what to say; then he put his hands on the boy’s shoulders, who was almost a head taller than him, and said, “Try to stay calm. You’ll see, in the end you’ll be doing fine here.”

Marius realized that his grandfather wouldn’t have left him in that condition: in his little concerned gesture the boy saw that, even if in his own way, his grandfather loved him, and this gave him the strength to smile. He put his hands on his grandfather’s and said, “Maybe you’re right, I just need a little time to get myself used to all of this. Don’t worry about me.” Hearing those words, monsieur Gillenormand felt reassured and bid goodbye to his young grandson, knowing that, after all, he would have met him again in seven weeks.

 

The inside of the college was astonishing: the building had to be gothic, judging from its old stone walls and the long hallways of the principal courtyard, skilfully divided in aisles by high light-coloured columns and groin vaults; the classrooms had warm wooden and panelled ceilings. A wide, majestic stairway next to the old entrance, which Marius supposed it had been built in an even later period of time, led to the first floor, where the headmaster’s office and most of the classrooms were located. In order to get to Myriel’s office, the old bishop made Marius go through one of the hallways which fronted onto the church. From the windows, the boy saw a great hustle and bustle of students: they looked happy and not a bit snob. Perhaps his grandfather was right: all in all, those students seemed normal, simple teenagers, just like the ones he used to know in his old school. Monseigneur Myriel saw Marius smiling shyly and seemed to be glad about it.

“Well, Marius, I’ve showed you all the classrooms and the labs of the school, but forgive me, I can’t remember which course you’re going to attend here.”

“Law, sir.” Something in the bishop’s voice made Marius aware that he cared sincerely about his students, and the boy quite liked this.

“Ah, very good choice! Are you thinking of learning some law rudiments in order to become a policeman, later, like your father?”

“Forgive me, monseigneur, but… how do you know about my father?”

 

“Well, my dear boy… oh, please: have a seat.” While talking, they had entered the vast office. It was the only room seen by Marius completely made of wood, from the walls to the ceiling: only the floor was in light-coloured stone, like in the whole building. They took a seat at a desk in front of a stained-glass wall depicting some religious scene which at the moment Marius couldn’t identify, and monseigneur Myriel got back to talking. “You see, Marius, I may seem an old snoop, but I like knowing as much as I can about my students - of course, avoiding strictly private matters: I could talk to them about these things at the confessional. I find that getting to know my students can make my work easier.”

Even though Marius felt profoundly uncomfortable and intrusive, he asked his new headmaster, “May I ask… why? I mean… what’s the point of knowing your students’ life?”

Monseigneur Myriel seemed surprised by such a question. He stood up a little bit from the chair, getting closer to Marius, and, smiling, he told him, “Why, to help them more easily, of course.” Marius was maybe even more surprised than the bishop had been earlier. Helping the students? His previous headmaster never went out of his office, unless there was too much chaos in the hallways to teach. Isn’t helping the students solve their problems the work of school counsellors?

“For instance…”, monseigneur Myriel talked again, reading the confusion in Marius’s eyes, “How could I help you acclimatize if I didn’t know that until the beginning of this summer you’ve always lived with your father, and that after his death the only legal ward was your grandfather, and you now live with him? How could I help you if I didn’t know that you probably feel uncomfortable because you’ve come here forced by him? Not to mention that, probably, you’re still grieving for your father: may God take care of his soul, poor man. I want my students to know that I’m not a threat to them, I’m not an important person to be afraid of or to be frightened by. In my school I don’t want kids to study to be the best in their profession: I want them to grow in knowledge and soul, in order to be honest, wise and merciful men and women in the future.” Hearing these words, Marius seemed reassured: monseigneur Myriel was sincere, he could feel that.

“You’ll be fine here, Marius: I promise!”

With these words, the bishop dismissed his new student, wishing him luck for his first day.


	2. First day at Saint-Denis - Grantaire

**_Grantaire_ **

It was already 9.00 a.m. and in the square in front of the school entrance there weren’t any more students: they had all come in, on time for the start of their classes. A lean-bodied boy, alone, was running across the large square, hoping of arriving before the school caretaker, Père Fauchelevent, closed the front doors. Grantaire ran along the façade of the Saint-Denis abbey, he turned the corner and at last he could see the entrance gate of his school. He was still running as fast as he managed to when he saw the young caretaker apprentice, Feuilly, chatting with him whom he had been learning the job from and leaning against the wall of the cathedral: he couldn’t hear what they were saying, but he understood that Feuilly had been waiting for him.

When he was halfway through the passage between the church and the school, Feuilly recognized him. “Blast you, Grantaire! You’re late even on the first day!”

“I know… I-I’m sorry!” Grantaire was out of breath and his forehead was covered with his sweat-damped black curls.

“Don’t tell me you’re late because you’ve drunk even yesterday night! I thought we would’ve reached this point in weeks, not on the first day!”

“No, no… *huff* it’s not… *pant* like you think.”

“What the hell happened to you, then?”

There was no answer: the only thing that Feuilly got with that question was an absent-minded look on the face of the student, followed by a sweet little smile addressed to his own thoughts. He looked at him for a while, probably trying to figure out what he was thinking, but he gave up soon. “Alright, I see you have no intention to tell me. Off you go, now, before the deputy headmaster comes!” This sentence made Grantaire snap out of his thoughts. The boy crossed the huge gates waving his hand and thanking his friend, and while passing by the garden to reach the enormous portal, he went back to his memories.

It was true: he wasn’t late because he had got drunk the night before, not at all. He’d been too much excited waiting for that day to do anything. He hadn’t even slept! He had left early in the morning, luggage in hand, a slice of bread and Nutella in a hurry and he had headed straight to the student house where he would have been living during that school year, like the others. He was so excited by the idea of seeing each other again that he hadn’t thought of anything else during the whole of his travel, bouncing in the streets and dancing with anyone he had happened to meet on his way: whoever met him couldn’t help smiling. Maybe precisely because of this display of joy, when he got to the residence in Rue Denfert Rochereau his friends weren’t there anymore. He was a little disappointed, but he didn’t let himself become discouraged: he retrieved the keys to his usual room, he immediately ran up the stairs next to the entrance, threw his luggage on the floor without caring to keep the room tidy, and ran back to the hall to go to school on time and speak to each other before classes. If only the landlady hadn’t stopped him! Maybe he could have made it, they could have been together even for only a minute!…

“Could someone explain to me why on earth whenever you’re here chaos rules this place?!”

“I’m sorry, madame… but I’m late and I threw my things down randomly!”

“Yep. And you’ve covered my floor with mud as well!”

“Oh…” Grantaire looked down at his shoes: they were actually in a miserable condition, but he had been too much lost in his thoughts to notice that. “I’ve crossed the park while coming here. I suppose yesterday’s rain left the soil… a little bit muddy…”

“A little bit?! Are you kidding me?! You are going to clean every inch on which you’ve walked on with your shitty shoes, you get it?! Or I’ll throw you out of here!”

“I do get it, madame… but I’m late…”

“YOU GET IT?!” Grantaire was sure he’d never seen her so angry, therefore he didn’t feel like answering back.

“You couldn’t have explained yourself better, madame Thénardier!” He drew his eyes away from that woman, aware of the fact that she was still staring at him with eyes that looked just like the devil’s.

And that was why, that morning, young Grantaire was late.

Thinking of the moment in which they would have met again, that evening, Grantaire climbed up the back stairs near the library in order to get more quickly to the art lab, but he forgot that on that floor was the deputy headmaster’s office too. He realized this only when, halfway through the stairs, he met his ex-philosophy teacher. Seeing him in the hallway after the beginning of the classes, he grabbed Grantaire by the arm and he dragged him down the stairs, back towards the ground floor.

“You must be mad, my boy. Was a month enough for you to forget how dreadful the deputy headmaster is when he gets angry?”

“Of course not, professor Valjean. I just think I may be a little… distracted, this morning.”

“Well, whatever is distracting you, try to focus until you reach your classroom. Getting professor Javert angry on the first day surely is an unfortunate idea.”

“I’ll try. Well… thanks for saving my bacon, prof. As usual, I’d say!”

Professor Valjean was every student’s saviour. They could always count on him whenever they were in trouble of any kind. He was always willing to listen to whoever was in need to talk to him and had always a good piece of advice for every situation. He never failed, and nobody knew how he could always have a suitable solution for every problem.

“From tomorrow, try to be on time, or at least not to be seen by that hound dog: this year he’ll be keeping score of everyone who’s late!” Valjean advised Grantaire, putting a hand on his shoulder.

Grantaire couldn’t believe what he had just heard. “Hasn’t that man got anything better to do?”

“Apparently not” said Valjean, almost laughing: it was a chuckle in which one could sense a certain patient exasperation. “Warn your friends as well, this evening at the student house.”

“Sure. Thanks again, prof!”

While heading towards the lab, trying to focus on what he was doing, Grantaire passed next to a half-opened door. On instinct he glanced inside the room: his heart began to beat relentlessly in his chest and he couldn’t stop the smile dawning on his lips. He saw whom he had been wanting to see, as usual by the window, mind racing through who knows what thoughts, that face and those gorgeous blonde hair enlightened by the sun coming from the window panes. That perfect moment didn’t last much, though, as professor Mabeuf noticed he had left the door open and, without looking away from the book he was reading, he closed it.

Grantaire sat smiling on the cool floor for some moments before standing up and heading to his classroom, daydreaming.


	3. First day at Saint-Denis - Joly

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Joly is in his classroom listening to his science's professor introduction. While he's listening to his heartbeat, the door opens and a friend enters to talk to him...

**_Joly_ **

‘Uhm… my tongue seems to be of a normal colour… I can’t see spots, nor plaques… good. What about my pulse? I wouldn’t want a heart attack to take me by surprise!’ observed Joly in his mind, laying the compact that he always had in his pocket down and placing two fingers on his wrist. He wasn’t paying attention to the lesson at all. He was too busy checking that he wasn’t mortally ill to listen to the teacher and to his very interesting introducing speech about what they would have learned that year. Luckily for him, the science lab was huge and there, at the back, behind gigantic glass containers filled with different chemicals which Joly was sure could have somehow intoxicated him had they been spilled, nobody would have ever noticed him. He was quite a tranquil guy, not exactly one of those boys always in the spotlight, and yet he was constantly very cheerful and kind to everybody.

Checking his pulse, he heard the door behind him open slightly.

“Bossuet! You’ve made me lose count! I’ll have to start all over again now” Joly whispered loudly, stopping the timer on his mobile phone he had set to make sure that he counted correctly. Bossuet, as his friends called him, just looked at him with a stunned and incredulous face. “Why, good day to you too, Joly! Yes, I’m fine, holiday’s been great, thanks for asking. Of course, I’ve missed you too so much!”

“I was checking my pulse and, like I said, I’ve lost count… But what are you doing here?”

“What am I doing here?! I couldn’t have waited until tonight before seeing you, that’s what I’m doing here!”

Then Joly quickly grabbed his phone, which was still on the immense white-tiled counter, and furtively went out of the classroom with Bossuet: his teacher was too busy praising the wonders of the digestive system to notice what was happening, so the two boys closed the door behind them.

“We haven’t met at all during these one and a half months! I’ve missed you to death!” said Bossuet, putting a hand on his shoulder.

Joly looked around. Good: no one was in sight.

“I’ve missed you so much, too!” He flung himself between Bossuet’s arms and he held him tight. Seeing them, it was as plain as day that there was more than a friendship between them, but in a bishop-managed school, displaying such kind of a relationship isn’t exactly advisable.

Still hugging his boyfriend, Joly went on: “My parents wanted me to spend the holiday at my Granny’s…”

Bossuet must have heard some uncertainty in his voice, typical of who’s not telling the whole truth, because he said: “You wanted to stay there as long as you could, didn’t you?”

At that point Joly distanced himself from his chest, still clinging to his arms, he looked at Bossuet’s almost reproaching face and he felt obliged to explain: “Well… sea air is very good for one’s thyroid, so…”

“So you preferred jilting me because of your imaginary thyroid disease, right?”

“Well, just in case… health comes first…” They looked at each other silently: Bossuet seemed outraged by this sentence. “Are you angry with me?”

Joly had such a set of puppy eyes that Bossuet couldn’t help smiling, moving away his distinctive lock of brown hair, pulling him close with one hand on his left cheek and kissing him on the other one, telling him: “Tell me just how I can be angry with you…”

They kept looking into each other’s eyes for a while, silently. One and a half months had really been a very long time for them.

“What about you? What have you been up to this summer?” Joly went on like nothing had happened.

“Well, I went to Marseille for a few days with my parents. There was sunshine hot enough to fry an egg!”

“Did you remember to wear a hat every day, this year? I still remember when last summer, in the park, you completely scorched your head studying for the final tests!” Joly wasn’t exaggerating with his worries. Bossuet was completely bald, but he almost seemed to be proud of his condition: he constantly had his baldness out in the open, and on very few occasions he wore a hat or a bandana.

“Eh eh… no. I scorched myself on the first day and I spent the rest of the holiday in bed because of the sunstroke I got. My temperature was of 39 degrees. Back home, I sprained an ankle strolling in Montmartre with my parents, and I spent another week in bed. But the good news is, I’m not dead yet!” That was Bossuet. As unlucky as few in the whole world, Bossuet had learned to laugh at everything. He could always find the silver lining even when things were getting tragic.

The two boys made each other complete. During a storm happening to catch them by surprise, Joly would see the risk of getting ill with bronchial pneumonia, while Bossuet would take the chance to refresh himself and to enjoy the wonderful view of the rainbow. Despite the fact that they were very different, they couldn’t have been closer: they had been seeing each other for two years already and they still were as close as the first day.

“You know, I just can’t see how you can be still alive” said Joly, looking at Bossuet in a slightly shocked way.

“What can I say? Maybe, as far as my bad luck allows, I’m very fortunate!” he answered, bursting in a loud laugh; Joly covered his mouth before he could be heard and then Bossuet remembered he was at school.

“You do remember we should be to lesson and not out here, yes?”

“Now I do. Oh, by the way! I’ve met Grantaire in the hallway, while coming here. He didn’t even notice me. Maybe he’s having a hangover, what do you think?”

“That depends. Was he near professor Mabeuf’s classroom?” Joly felt like smiling. He and Grantaire had been friends for a year, more or less, and they lived in the same student house; therefore, seeing each other every day, they had become very familiar by then.

“Well, yes, but what does it have to do with…” Just as he was talking, Bossuet understood what Joly was thinking of. “Oooooooh, right! Now I understand why he didn’t see me! Our friend was too distracted!” The both of them burst into laughter, trying to keep their voices low.

“Now that I think of it: is there anyone else in class? Are you guys all in the halls?” said Joly, wiping the tears that had fallen on his face when he was trying to stifle the laughter.

“I don’t know. Well, that nerd of Combeferre surely’s in class! I wanted to drop by and say hello, but I don’t think he’d go out of the room just to see me!” Bossuet answered him, while on his face dawned a look which at a first glance could have been regarded as outraged and upset, but that in truth disguised much fondness.

“Why are you even around here, now that I come to think of it? Haven’t you got class?”

“I haven’t. Professor Javert is dealing with the last files and records along with the headmaster, so he’s not come to class yet. There’s a new student, did you know?”

Joly didn’t answer. He was staring at his boyfriend with a concerned look when he said: “I mean… you had the guts to go out of Javert’s class?”

Bossuet shrugged, not getting what there was to worry about, and said: “Not during his class, because he wasn’t even there.”

“Have you gone nuts?! What if he arrives while you’re here talking to me?! Have you any idea of how much trouble you could get into?!” Joly seemed furious while saying these words, but he really was just worried: considering Bossuet’s extreme bad luck, at least he would have had to spend a month helping Feuilly clean, after the lessons.

Bossuet stared at him for some seconds, bug-eyed, motionless as if he had been just petrified by his boyfriend’s warning. Suddenly he came back to life; he grabbed Joly by the shoulders and he pulled him close to kiss him. Before running away as fast as the wind he sweetly whispered to him: “See you at the end of the classes, baby!”

Despite the fact that Joly was worried that something could go wrong, he’d been very happy of Bossuet’s surprise for him: all in all, even if he was busy checking that he wasn’t ill, between a check and the next he looked at the clock on his phone, counting the minutes remaining to the end of the day.

With a smile fixed on his face, Joly went back to the classroom and began counting his heartbeats again, which now, thanks to the meeting with Bossuet, he could feel much more clearly.


	4. First day at Saint-Denis - Marius (2)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> For Marius it's time to start the lessons! Talking to the headmaster he has lost an hour, so his first lesson is held by an incredible prosessor, who's named Valjean.

**_Marius_ **

After his chat with headmaster Myriel, young Marius had been sitting outside the philosophy classroom for nearly forty minutes: he had tried to go to the room, but once there he hadn’t had the nerve to get inside in the middle of the literature lesson; therefore, he had headed straight to the room where they would have had class on the second period. His mind was plagued with a multitude of contrasting thoughts: everybody had told him that he would have been fine, that he had to stay calm, and looking at the other students he had convinced himself that they were right; yet, he couldn’t shelve the idea that he didn’t belong to that place at all. He felt really confused, agitated, and his hands had begun shaking again when he realized that the bell that would have marked the start of his first lesson would have rung in less than five minutes. All of a sudden he felt his heart beating madly in his chest and he felt like he was about to throw up. What on earth would have he even thrown up?! That morning his stomach was so unsettled that he hadn’t even been able to drink a sip of tea! He was just about to go find a restroom when suddenly the class door opened and out came a man, slightly taller than him, with thick, curly, grizzled hair and deep, dark-green eyes.

“Oh… good day, young man” he said when he saw him. Marius realized he had to have a ridiculous appearance, because that man had a strange smile on his face, like he wanted to laugh but was too polite to do that.

“Who are you? I don’t remember we’ve met yet.” Then, seeing Marius’s embarrassment, he added: “I’m professor Valjean, I teach philosophy.”

Now that professor showed a reassuring smile, giving Marius his hand to introduce himself properly, and the boy felt slightly more comfortable.

“Marius Pontmercy. It’s my first day here” he said with a shy smile, shaking his hand.

“Pontmercy, you said?”

“Yes, professor…”

“That name rings a bell…” Valjean looked away, pensive, and went inside the room; he noticed that Marius wasn’t following him, and the boy saw him as he turned around and gestured to come in. “Please come, make yourself at home: don’t be shy! Sit here, next to me.”

Marius accepted the offer and, even if he was a little bit uncomfortable, he grabbed a chair from the well-disposed desks and took seat next to the professor, who in the meantime was browsing through a paper register.

“Here you are! Marius Pontmercy. Apparently you’ll have class with me, next period. Oh well.” Professor Valjean glanced at the wall clock behind him, but he looked at his wristwatch too, almost like he wanted to be sure that the time was right.

“I think that telling you to go for a walk wouldn’t make sense. In a short time the bell’s going to ring!”

Hearing this, Marius started to feel that oppressive sickness once more.

“Well, uhm… m-maybe I’ll just wait outside…” He was already about to stand up in order to go look for a restroom when the professor interrupted him: “Why, no, don’t you worry. Stay here. Let’s have a chat, so that I can get to know you better.”

How to tell no to a man with such a reassuring and gentle smile as professor Valjean? Marius sat down again, but he still couldn’t calm himself.

“Well, Marius. Why were you out there instead of being to class?”

“Oh, uhm… I tried to go to class… but it had already begun and I… I haven’t had the nerve to go in…”

“Oh, I see. You’re a victim of the typical first day unease, aren’t you?”

He didn’t answer. Marius felt really too much unsettled to say anything at all. He couldn’t even look at Valjean’s face. He mainly kept his gaze fixed on the floor, apart from some moments in which he glanced at the hands of the big clock, running fast towards the time at which he would have had to face reality. Just for a second, Marius glanced up and he saw Valjean looking at him in the same way in which a father looks at his son.

“So, why did you choose law in particular?” Valjean seemed to be able to imagine how Marius was feeling in that moment, and the boy understood that he was looking for a way to take his mind off his thoughts, in order to appease him. But once more, Marius couldn’t answer.

“You know… during these years, my pupils have given very different answers to me. Some want to be lawyers, some want to pursue a career in politics, some others prefer having a sound basis and then signing up for the police academy; and often, when I ask them why they have chosen this, they tell me ‘why, but for the cash, professor’.” Telling this anecdote, the professor started to smile, staring straight into Marius’s eyes who had decided at last to look at him.

“Oh, no, no! I wasn’t thinking about money. I’d like to become a judge.”

“Really? And why not a lawyer?”

“Well… a lawyer gets cases assigned to him independently from the fact that the indicted is guilty or not. Of course, he can refuse to defend a client if he’s convinced of his guiltiness, but how can one know, after all? One could agree to defend a criminal only to gain more money, and no one would ever know. Instead, a judge finds himself directly in front of the bare truth: he doesn’t have to defend anyone, he only has to judge the guiltiness or innocence of who’s in front of him. It’s easier doing the right thing being in that position… and that’s what really matters to me: doing the right thing.”

While he was talking, Professor Valjean looked like he was listening to him, fascinated, and when Marius noticed that, he realized that the words had come spontaneously out of his mouth, without having measured or thought them.

“A very noble aim, indeed. The world needs more people like you.” While Valjean was talking, the bell signalling the start of the next period rang and this reminded him of something. “Now that I think of it… in your class you’re going to find a boy who thinks exactly like you do. Maybe you’ll get along well.”

Marius was sincerely well-impressed by that professor: in his words and his attitude he could find a goodness that he had rarely seen in any person.

“Ah! Here they come! Good: put the chair back in place and wait here, so that I can introduce you to the class.”

Marius followed the directives. The moment of the truth had come. Now he couldn’t flee anymore in order not to face that first day of school. He had met two people who had made a very good impression on him; then why did he have to feel so damn anxious? Now that the time was so close, he was feeling out of breath, but he made everything not to make that apparent. He was trying to calm himself in any way he could even if the students hadn’t come in yet. By the way… he wondered how much time it would’ve taken them to come to class.

“Good day, kids! Did you enjoy your holidays?”

Not much, clearly. While everyone was coming in, Marius felt himself really stupid, standing there next to the teacher’s desk, and it seemed to him that he was being stared at by every person passing beside him. Even so, he acted as nothing was happening, or at least he tried. From time to time, he looked up to the door to see what his new classmates looked like, but as soon as he would meet someone’s eyes, he would stare back at the floor. In what looked like a classroom made mostly of male students to him, only one boy caught his eye: he’d heard him stopping on the doorstep to talk to the teacher, and there he noticed him. He was different from the others: he gave the impression of a determined, iron-willed person, but in those blue eyes of his, Marius could read some kind of goodness, too. Something in that boy attracted him, but he couldn’t exactly understand what. Was he the student which professor Valjean had told him about?

When their eyes met, none of them looked away: instead, that iron-willed student gave him a hint of a small wave followed by a honest smile which Marius managed to reciprocate easily.

As soon as everyone came in, professor Valjean closed the door, making sure that no one had been left outside.

“Good day, everyone. There are several things I’d like to talk to you about before starting our class. First of all, welcome back: I hope you enjoyed your holiday and you’re ready to start this new school year.” Marius noticed Valjean’s radiant smile with which he was greeting his students as he went near him to put a hand on the boy’s shoulder.

“I’d like, then, to introduce to you Marius Pontmercy. It’s his first year in our school, but I trust you’re going to make him feel at home in this class properly. Marius, welcome to the Saint-Denis college. Please, have a seat.”

There was a free desk near the window, just before the blue-eyed boy’s, and Marius had no problem sitting there.

“For those of you who last year had classes with my colleague, I’m professor Jean Valjean. As you’ve probably already grasped, I teach philosophy. Many of you might ask why, having chosen political science as your course, you are obliged to study philosophy. Well, you’ll be politicians and lawmen and women, stern and respectful of our Constitution and its laws, but just and forgiving too, if the case requires so. Justice isn’t all about applying rules and punishing the lawbreakers by means of an appropriate penalty; it’s also about respecting the people who will rely on you so that justice is done. In order to do so, I’ll try to teach you the right moral principles.” Marius noticed some boys muttering things to each others, almost surprised by the professor’s words. Instead, he was deeply moved: in front of him, there was a man who saw the world exactly as he did.

Valjean looked at his students’ incredulous eyes and went on talking, still smiling: “Good. Now I’m going to describe to you this year’s programme and the list of your textbooks; after that, everyone’ll briefly introduce himself to the class.” That said, he sat at his desk and started reading a list of philosophers they would have studied during the year.

Marius calmed himself and felt the impulse to laugh at himself for having been in such an anxious state: he could see before him a year which promised to be wonderful.


	5. First day at Saint-Denis - Bahorel

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bahorel didn't feel to go to his lessons that day, so he stayed all morning sitting on the school's garden stairs. While he was playing his guitar, he saw someone who he knew in the garden...

**_Bahorel_ **

The day flew fast in the great school: before the students could notice, the end of the third and, for that first day, last period rang. Silence ruled the halls of the magnificent building; apart from a sort of whisper coming out timidly from the closed classrooms, one could hear only the echo of footsteps of some students or teachers temporarily outside. However, that silence was soon interrupted by a gentle guitar sound. Bahorel was sitting on the last step of the low stairs connecting the building to the front garden and he was playing the instrument which his friends had wanted to give to him as a present last Christmas. Of course, they would never have expected to hear him play that wonderful reddish–wooden acoustic guitar at school, but they could’ve imagined it: Bahorel used to skip school all the time and this had prevented him passing to the next class for so much as two times. That year, he intended to try to attend classes just enough to be able to graduate, at least.

This good intention went down the pan already on the first day, since he hadn’t shown up for class. The evening before, he had received recommendations from his friends on their Whatsapp group to the point in which the chat had got jammed with texts, and he had promised to go to school. ‘Well… at least I’ve come to school!’ He had been saying this to himself, laughing, as if he had managed to bypass his friends’ pressures. He knew that probably, as soon as they had gathered for lunch, they’d have got angry; therefore, perhaps it was better not to tell them that, once arrived in front of the school doors, he had come back and had spent the whole morning in the little bar in Place Victor Hugo, in front of Saint-Denis abbey. No, he would’ve acted like nothing had happened. This was the reason why he’d come to school: he would’ve waited for them there, and nobody would have suspected a thing. Maybe Feuilly would have called his bluff when they all had gone out together, but in that case too much time would have passed already for the others to be really angry with him. Besides, his friends were all younger and smaller than him: what the hell would they have wanted to preach him about, those shrimps?

He had to admit, though, that he had missed those kiddies during the holiday; all in all, they were more like a family than a group of friends. Thinking about those crazy guys made him strum away on the guitar and singing to himself on the melody of Queen’s ‘ _Friends Will Be Friends’_. He was just about to end the refrain when he saw one of his friends himself, in the middle of the great, flowering garden: a tiny boy, with messy, reddish, rather long hair and dressed with clothes so large that even Bahorel could’ve put them on, even if they were so hideous and mismatched that he would never have worn them for real. Bahorel couldn’t get wrong: what other teenage boy would have started picking flowers in plain daylight, risking to be seen by everybody?

“Jehan, what are you doing out here? Don’t you have class?” Only then he realized that catching up with him had been a stupid thing to do: who knows what excuse he would have had to make up, in order to explain why he wasn’t to class!

“Oh, Bahorel! How nice to see you again! We haven’t been assigned our English teacher yet, so now we have a free period. I really couldn’t stay inside a room on such a beautiful day!” That was without a doubt the longest sentence that Bahorel had ever heard him utter.

As shy as he was tiny, Jean Prouvaire was one of the youngest boys of their group and he had just started to attend the literature course: he was fond of literature, whatever period of time it had been written in, but especially Medieval literature, and that was the reason why his friends called him Jehan[1].

“What about you? Why aren’t you in class?” For a moment, Bahorel had hoped that Jehan didn’t ask him, but now his only choice was making up a believable excuse. Unfortunately, his friend’s huge blue eyes staring at him and waiting for his answer were pushing too much.

“Professor Javert’s very busy this morning, so we too are straight in the middle of a free period. You know, he and his deputy headmasters duties…” Bahorel didn’t even remember if he would have had class with Javert on that period, but that had been the first thing that had come to his mind and, anyway, he had said it.

“Oh, I see.” Jehan cracked a shy, yet very sweet smile like he alone could do, and then he went back to his flowers.

Bahorel ducked down next to his friend and watched him for some moments, then he said: “What are you up to with those flowers?”

“Ah… well, I…” His face as red as a cherry, Jehan fumbled for words with which to go on talking: “I’m making… I’m making garlands for you all…”

“Are you really?” Bahorel would have never put on a flower garland, but he didn’t venture to say that to him openly: “W-which is mine?”

“Oh… ehm… I-I thought you didn’t want it, so… so, I didn’t make it…”

Bahorel definitely didn’t know what else to do. It wasn’t exactly in his disposition to be sweet and gentle, and he really didn’t know how to react to the unpredictable answers of a sensitive person like Jean Prouvaire.

“Why! You’re denying me the pleasure of destroying it in your face?” He said this jokingly, but probably Jehan didn’t get it because he looked like he was about to cry.

“Hey, hey, hey! I was joking, I was joking! Don’t pull that face! I didn’t mean to offend you, believe me! It was just a joke!” He was totally panicking, trying somehow to avoid what would’ve been a complete nervous breakdown. He didn’t have anything against Jehan, but he really didn’t know how to talk to that boy who was so different from him.

“Oh… you scared me, for a moment…” Breakdown avoided. Jehan looked behind Bahorel and exclaimed: “Hey! That’s the guitar we gave to you!”

“Yeah, totally. It’s almost always with me.”

“Then it was you who was playing, earlier!”

“Well, yes. I think no one else would start playing something in the halls of this school.” Realizing that he was once more about to trip by running the risk of making Jehan feel stupid, Bahorel changed subject: “How about I play something while you’re finishing your garlands?”

“Al-… alright!”

“You want to hear something in particular?” said Bahorel, grabbing his guitar from his shoulders.

Jehan thought about it for a moment, then said: “C-could you play for me ‘ _Hallelujah’_ by Jeff Buckley… please?”

“Anything you want.”

Bahorel had found a good way of staying there with Jehan without the necessity of them talking to each other: by singing, for sure he couldn’t risk hurting him somehow, and they would have kept each other company until the other guys had ended their classes. There was a very nice mood now: the sky was bright blue, with great white clouds on the horizon, and the sweet music spread delicately in the whole garden. Bahorel’s bass voice was quite deep, yet it turned out to be wonderfully sweet and relaxing while singing Hallelujah, and Jehan felt all the more at peace with that beautiful day.

Once he was done playing, Bahorel noticed Jehan was looking up in the air, completely absorbed in contemplating something in the sky.

“What are you looking at?” he asked him, trying to figure what he was observing out.

“Look at that cloud!” said Jehan, pointing at somewhere in the sky.

“Which one?”

“That one, exactly in the middle, straight above us.” Bahorel put a hand on his arm and tried to look where his friend was pointing at.

“Oh, that one! What’s so special with it?” To Bahorel, that was a cloud as common as ever, a white shapeless mass.

“It looks like a huge coffee grinder. It’s very odd!”

A coffee grinder? What person could ever see a coffee grinder in a cloud? Bahorel really couldn’t make sense of it: he didn’t see a damn thing in that cloud, but he was curious to know whether Jehan was just too imaginative or it was high time he saw a psychologist.

“Sorry, but… where the hell can you see a coffee grinder in that?”

“Yeah, well, look!” Jehan took his arm with his hands and tried to use it to show him where the various components of that mysterious coffee grinder were. “There’s the box for the coffee beans, and then, under that, the handle to grind them…” He went on describing and using Bahorel’s arm to point to the sky, but he just couldn’t see it.

However, he just acted as if he could: “Oh, yes! There! Now I see it.”

Jehan let go of his friend’s muscular arm, smiled at him and went back to looking at the sky. Jehan loved looking at the sky: he liked letting his gaze get lost in the infinity of the celestial sphere both by day and by night; he was fascinated by both the shape of the clouds and the starlight, so much that it was easy to find him with his face turned to the sky, his thoughts lost in distant worlds and his eyes full of wonder.

“Do you want me to play something else while we’re waiting for the others?” Bahorel asked, grabbing his guitar.

“May I ask ‘ _Somewhere over the Rainbow’_?”

How many sweet songs he was playing, that morning! Bahorel wasn’t used to all that tranquillity, but that didn’t matter to him: doing something different was strangely pleasant, for once. They went on like that, among relaxing songs and absurd cloud shapes which Bahorel couldn’t see, until the bell announcing the end of the school rang.

 

* * *

[1] Reference to the novel. In his description, Victor Hugo writes, “His name was Jehan, owing to that petty momentary freak which mingled with the powerful and profound movement whence sprang the very essential study of the Middle Ages.”


	6. First day at Saint-Denis - Combeferre

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> First school's day is finished, but Combeferre is still in chemistry's schoolroom to copying his notes. It's time to go home, so Courfeyrac and the other guys enter in the schoolroom to bring him with them.

**_Combeferre_ **

The bell had already rung several minutes before, but Combeferre, equipped with his reading glasses, was still sitting at the science lab counter, rewriting his notes. Staying there didn’t bother him: in the silence of that room, he could stay focused on what he was studying. Combeferre was a very quiet and studious boy, and he was interested in several things: there wasn’t question he couldn’t answer, there was never a time in which he couldn’t take part in a conversation. He was now attending the second year of the scientific course par excellence: he was curious, and he wanted to know how the inner workings ruling the Universe operated. But he had one true vocation, too: medicine. He considered helping people as an essential part of his life and he didn’t feel suited for doing anything else.

He was rewriting his anatomy notes with tranquillity when the door behind him burst open.

“Hey there, nerd! Still locked up in this booth? We were waiting for you in the courtyard, but I told the guys, ‘You’ll see, Combeferre’s still in the lab for sure!’, and as I thought, here you are!”

Combeferre gave a slow sigh: so long tranquillity. He closed his notebook using a calmness and an elegance which he alone possessed, without even speaking a word, but on his face now there was that typical look of resigned patience well-known by his friends.

“That’s right, I was here rewriting my notes because I’m sure that tonight you guys won’t leave me any time to do that.” He didn’t turn around: he knew perfectly well who was behind him.

“By that you mean you didn’t miss us?!” The person talking to him was now standing just behind him, watching him as he put his things away.

“By that I mean I want to keep up with the programme from the very first day.”

“Nerd.”

“Are you planning to go on forever?” The boy hugged him from behind, friendly, and at last they looked at each other, face to face.

“Come on, I’m joking! You know how I am!” And indeed Combeferre wasn’t angry, not because he’d been called a nerd, at least. Courfeyrac had been a joker since they first met, three years before: Combeferre remembered very well how Courfeyrac had stained him completely with green paint on their first day of school. However, the two boys had become great friends and had always been together after Courfeyrac, to make it up to Combeferre for having ruined his clothes, had lent him his own, going around in his underwear.

“You know, I just don’t see why you insist on staying here after the end of the classes.” As he said this, Courfeyrac stood up and went to the opposite wall, towards the small windows. “It’s dark in here, and it’s all so… serious! So white and sterile… It’s just too clean!”

“It’s a science lab. Here, among other subjects, we study chemistry and anatomy: it MUST be clean.”

“But it’s sad in here! You know what?”, Courfeyrac said, pensive. Combeferre got worried: nothing good had ever happened every time Courfeyrac had begun a sentence with those words! He still let him go on, to see where he was going with that. “This room needs some colour!”

“You will NOT spill some substance just to add a touch of colour to the room: you’ve already done that on our second year and we both got into trouble!” Combeferre had an alarmed look on his face, remembering what professor Javert had made them go through, but Courfeyrac looked like he was amused.

“Ahahah! That was cool!”

Courfeyrac was made that way: he seemed not to be familiar with grumpiness and bad mood, he always had a smile and a joke for everyone. He was a very lively kind of person, yet he was also a little bit naïve; sometimes, this made him look like a silly goose, but in his jokes there were wittiness and self-confidence which could be found only among the smartest people. He got along with everybody and he always knew how to lighten the mood when things were difficult.

“Ah! There you are! Courfeyrac said that you’d have been here, but I’ve hoped until the last moment that he was wrong…” Grantaire entered the old lab; Joly, Bossuet, Bahorel and Jehan followed suit.

“Grantaire! Where have you been? And you two, also!” He smiled, pointing at Bahorel and Bossuet. “We’ve waited for you this morning, but you wouldn’t arrive!”

Grantaire went in the lab, allowing his friends at his back to move forward. As he sat on the counter next to Combeferre’s bag, he said, “Oh, well… there was so much traffic in the streets this morning… and I got held back by madame Thénardier, so I was very late.”

Bahorel followed him into the room, moving past Joly and Bossuet, putting his guitar down on the floor and leaning against the wall on the left of his friends. He put his hands in his pockets and said, “I had to go through a thousand words of recommendation from my parents at home, this morning, so I was late too.” Combeferre couldn’t believe any of Bahorel’s words, but for the moment he didn’t say anything.

“What about you, Bossuet?”

“Oh. I tripped over while I was going to the student house. I had to limp a little, so I suppose that slowed me down. But I arrived on time for the start of the first period.” Bossuet was standing next to the door with Joly and he had an arm around his shoulders, while Joly was resting his head on Bossuet’s shoulder.

“I couldn’t decide whether to be surprised by the fact that you’re always so happy or that you’re still alive, seeing all the things that happen to you!” said Bahorel with a half-surprised, half-bewildered look on his face.

“That’s what they all say.”

“I wonder why!” Grantaire seemed as surprised as Bahorel, but he felt like laughing, thinking of Bossuet’s bad luck.

“Wooo! Guys, have a look!” Hearing Courfeyrac speak, everybody turned to look at him. He was moving closer to them, pushing an old skeleton used by the anatomy students along with him. “Uncle Yorick’s still here! And he’s just as we left him last year!”

That poor skeleton had seen it all: during a detention spent in that lab because of an exploded chemical solution, Bossuet, Bahorel, Courfeyrac and Grantaire had used the old bone structure as a broom, a dancing partner, a mannequin for lab coats and a robot dancer. Combeferre still didn’t know how they had managed to use it as a broom, despite the fact that he’d been in the same room with them that day. However, he was sure that poor skeleton had gone through such things that, had it been alive, he would have given thanks for being eyeless, so that he couldn’t see any of the things they did to it. At that moment uncle Yorick, as Jehan had nicknamed it as a homage to Shakespeare, had spots all over its bones and on its head there was one of those transparent eye masks used by the chemistry students, exactly over the eye sockets.

“Ahahahah! Gee, such good memories!” Bossuet looked at the skeleton almost tenderly.

“Good memories? We spent all the afternoon scrubbing the counter tiles”, Joly disagreed.

“It may be so, but we had a great time!”

“I quote Joly”, Combeferre said, laughing resignedly under his breath while remembering that afternoon.

“Oh, come on, you were laughing too!” Courfeyrac told him, with an arm on uncle Yorick’s shoulder and pointing its skeletal hand towards the boy. “Besides, we were all together!”

“Oh, yes! I remember it very well!” Jehan went slightly closer to his friends, moving away from the doorjamb on which he had been leaning. “It was the first time we’d been together: we bonded a lot with each other on that occasion.”

As usual, the sweetness with which Jehan uttered his remark warmed the hearts of the little group of boys: Combeferre noticed it as they began smiling at each other.

“By the way… where’s our defender of liberty?” Combeferre asked, looking beyond the open door as if their friend were about to come in any time.

“Ah, I’ve met him. He told me that he’d have gone to visit Feuilly, and not to wait for him”, Courfeyrac answered, giving a nod towards the door almost as if the boy were there.

“Well, I guess we’re meeting him at lunch anyway. Shall we get going?” Grantaire said, getting down from the counter, caught by a certain heat.

“Ah, no, Grantaire. I’ve texted him earlier since this morning we haven’t heard of him. He’s answered that he’s very busy and that he would’ve dropped by to say hello, but he’d have gone straight to the student house afterwards”, Combeferre told him, closing his bag. “I guess he’s already left, since he’s not even dropped by.”

“Oh...” For a moment, Grantaire looked like he was a little disappointed, but he immediatley collected himself. “Well, I guess this evening he’ll deign to show himself! What are we going to do, meanwhile? Shall we have a bite to eat anyway down at the usual bar?”

Bahorel seemed to get alarmed. He went beside Grantaire, he put an arm around his neck and said, “Why don’t we try something new today, mmh? For a change.”

Combeferre’s concerns were getting bigger and bigger. Why didn’t he want to go to the usual bar in Place Victor Hugo? What was he trying to hide? However, once more,  Combeferre didn’t say anything.

“Mmh, why not? I know a nice place where they make a wonderful onion soup, one of the best in the city!” said Grantaire.

Courfeyrac supported him, saying, “Well, I’d like to try something new, actually. What about you guys?”

“Fine for me”, Bossuet said. “Combeferre?”

“What about you, Jehan?”

“If it’s fine for you, it’s fine for me too, you know that”, he answered, smiling softly.

“Alright, democratically, the majority wins. So be it!” Combeferre stood up from the stool, grabbed his bag and headed towards the door. “Courfeyrac, put uncle Yorick back to his place.”

After the skeleton was put back next to the closet and Courfeyrac told him to behave, the group of friends headed to the exit.

“Uhm, Grantaire... this place we’re going to... did it pass the health inspector’s evaluation?”

“Joly, please!”


	7. First day at Saint-Denis - Eponine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Near the Seine, in Saint-Denis, there's a little student house, called Musain. The owner, monsieur Thénardier, works there with his wife and his five children: the older one is a 14 years old girl that works with her parents after the lessons: her name is Eponine.

**_Éponine_ **

“I’m home!” Éponine exclaimed, closing the door of the student house where his parents worked, the Musain[1].

“Éponine, we’ve been waiting for you! Come help me clean the rooms before the guys arrive.”

“But mom! You promised that once I’d have started going to college I wouldn’t have had to work here with you anymore!”

“Certainly you’re not so busy already! It’s just the first day! Hurry, hurry!”

Even if she hadn’t had lunch yet, Éponine had no choice but climbing up the stairs in the hall to the first floor, plugging the vacuum cleaner in and helping her parents clean all the rooms. The Thénardiers, the girl’s parents, were such a kind of people that calling them penny pinchers would have meant complimenting them. After they’d lost their last, strictly underpaid maid, seven years before, they hadn’t wanted to take anyone on anymore, and they had kept all the business management exclusively within the family, in order not to pay wages to the staff. No wonder, then, if their eldest but still young daughter happened to be seen with a book in one hand and the vacuum cleaner in the other from time to time. Apart from her sister Azelma, who was two years younger than her, the rest of her little brothers – three boys – was too young to work with them. Éponine had asked her parents to relieve her from the chores when she’d have started her first year at college, since she wanted to focus on her studies, but as usual her parents had told her ‘yes’ just to keep doing what they liked anyway. When she and Azelma were younger, the Thénardier had spoiled them both a lot, but then something had gone wrong with their business – or so they had told her – and suddenly they had found themselves to be flat broke. Therefore, she’d started to help them with the student house, and the same fate was bestowed to her little sister, too.

At some point, while she was cleaning a room on the first floor beside the common room, she looked at two big orange suitcases on the bed on the left and had a moment of inspiration. “Mom, has anyone gone to fetch Gavroche from school?” she shouted towards the upper floor, calling from the stairwell.

“Wasn’t it your task to do today?” her mother shouted back from the second floor.

“No, it was dad’s!”

“Mine? Why, no, dear! I’ve spent this morning counting our guests’ money we got paid with!” This was her father, yelling from the third floor.

There, as expected: not only would she have had to be the maid of the house, that day; she would’ve had to babysit that brat she had for little brother, too! Luckily enough, she had almost finished cleaning the rooms: as soon as she cleaned up the whole floor, she went down to the kitchen, she cut a loaf of bread in half, she put there a slice of ham and one of cheese to make herself a sandwich, grabbed her bag from the reception counter and ran outside to go fetch the eldest of her little brothers.

As usual, the modern neighbourhood was packed with cars racing on the streets towards the lunch break and with many people hurrying on the sidewalks to their homes or to restaurants or bars. In other words, it wasn’t exactly the best environment where to let an eight-year-old child roam all by himself. Éponine knew well that, in case no one had shown up within fifteen minutes from the school bell ring, Gavroche would have come back home by himself. She glanced to the clock on her mobile phone and realized she was already late: the school bell had already rung twenty minutes before, more or less, and she ended up hoping that he hadn’t caught the bus yet. She walked faster, trying to get through the people walking on the sidewalk in the opposite direction. Why every time she was in a hurry did it seem that the whole human race was moving in the opposite direction of hers? She just couldn’t stand that! She was forced to jostle the people in order to make them let her through, and she cursed her parents for being always too busy minding their own business to realize they had given birth to no less than five children!

Éponine wasn’t like his parents at all. By working since she was a little girl, she’d become mature, responsible and independent; on the other hand, the Thénardiers were always busy making money, and they didn’t care much if it was in an honest or illegal way. They were so good at cleaning their guests’ pockets out that those same guests didn’t realize of having been robbed; that is, at least not until they had gotten back home. Then, they usually found themselves thinking of having lost all those money and precious objects during their travel, when instead they had been pocketed by the landlords. As busy as they were filling their pockets after this mysterious unsuccessful business, it was Éponine who had to take care of everything. Luckily, she was helped by Azelma!

When she got to the bus station, the vehicle had already arrived. It was definitely the bus number 3, the one she should’ve caught to go to Gavroche’s school, so Éponine had to sprint not to miss it. She got on, she sat on the rear seat next to the window, ready for a twenty minutes journey in which she could have breathed, at last. She was biting her improvised lunch when she heard the sound of Aphrodite’s Child’s ‘Rain and Tears’[2]. It took her some moments to remember it was her mobile ringtone and, taking the phone in her hand, she saw that her parents were calling her.

“Mom, what’s the matter?” They were the last people she wanted to talk to in that moment.

“Éponine, where on Earth are you?!” she heard a male voice talking to her from the other end of the line. Éponine was surprised when she recognized her father’s voice. “Dad? Why are you calling from Mom’s phone?”

“I didn’t want to spend money for nothing. Your mother has free calls towards your number, so… but that’s not the point!” he answered, trying not to change the subject.

“I’m on the bus. I’m fetching Gavroche from school.”

“What do you mean, you’re fetching Gavroche from school! We need you here at the reception, the students have arrived!” There was a moment of confusion in Éponine’s mind: she collected her thoughts, so to be certain of remembering the chain of events well, and she concluded that her father had become as mad as a hatter.

“But Dad, you told me yourself to go fetch Gavroche!” A certain impatience could be heard in Éponine’s voice, as if she were getting angry.

“Azelma’s going. You come back here immediately!”

“But Dad…”

“NOW!” Éponine understood: that was his ultimatum. She sighed and decided to get off at the next stop, and then to walk home as quickly as she could.

“Ok, I’m coming back!” she said with an annoyed tone, ending the call.

After few minutes the bus arrived at a stop and Éponine could at last get off and start walking briskly again, trying not to be overwhelmed by the people and, at the same time, to eat her sandwich. Arriving at the student house, she saw a whole slew of students squashed together in front of the counter, waiting for her in order to be allowed to go up to their rooms. Éponine took a deep breath, she threw her bag on the only free armchair next to the entrance and she thread her way through the crowd.

“Okay, here I am! Who’s the first?” she said as she went behind the counter, tying her dark long hair in a ponytail.

“Éponine! You look fine!” Courfeyrac, radiant, preceded his whole group.

“Guys! Welcome back! How have your holidays been? Fun?”

Bahorel was the first to answer her. “As usual: I went back to my parents’ and then we went to our house in the mountains. I’ve spent this month training and playing!”

Joly followed him, raising his arm to catch the girl’s attention. “I’ve been to the sea at my Granny’s! A sure-fire remedy for my thyroid!”

“And he left me behind!” Bossuet pointed out. Then he went on, “I’ve been to Marseille. I spent the week in bed due to a sunstroke; once back home, I’ve been confined to bed again because I twisted my ankle. I rested a lot, though!” Éponine had known Bossuet for four years, and by that time she expected nothing else from him.

Then it was Grantaire’s turn. “Ah, I’ve been to Lyons with my parents. My mother and sister visited the city, and I went with my old man to every local restaurant and bar!”

“I’ve been to London with my uncle and aunt,” Combeferre began speaking, gracefully. “It’s been a very interesting and beautiful holiday.” Then he went closer to the counter, moving Courfeyrac away, gently, putting a hand on his shoulder. He said to Éponine, “He’s been here for the holidays, hasn’t he?”

Éponine could read a veil of sadness and worry on his face; she nodded and said, “He’s already upstairs, waiting for you. Room 008, the same of last year.” She gave to him the second key for that room; Combeferre thanked her with a nod of his head and a polite smile, he told his friends he would’ve seen them later, he took back his suitcase and then he headed briskly to the first floor, almost as if he were anxious to join his roommate. The boys were silent for a moment, looking at each other in confusion; then Courfeyrac, who, as Éponine knew, was aware of the situation, tried to divert the attention from what had just happened. “This month I’ve been to my parents’ country mansion! I’d never been there because my mother never wants to go, but my father said, ‘Fuck that! We can go without her all the same!’, and so we did! It’s been really cool!”

It seemed that Courfeyrac’s strategy was working, because Jehan popped out from behind Bahorel’s broad shoulders and said softly, “I-I’ve managed to go to Florence with my parents… it’s been unforgettable! And… and what about you, Éponine?”

“I’ve stayed here to work with my parents… as usual!” The Thénardiers’ was not only a student house; the third and fourth floor were real hotel rooms for tourists. To be honest, it seemed more like a brothel than a hotel, but Éponine knew that her father wanted precisely that.

They would’ve stayed there talking for a little while longer, but there were several other students waiting for their room keys; therefore the girl handed to each his own and said goodbye.

“Ah, Courfeyrac! Feuilly’s gone to live with the school keeper, so you’ll have the room all for yourself”, she told the boy while handing him a copy of the key to his room.

“Woooo! Great!” Courfeyrac answered her excitedly, and then he went upstairs.

After fifteen minutes of key-delivering, more or less, Éponine noticed a boy she’d never seen before, sitting on a small armchair. He almost looked like he was lost: he was glancing around, nervous, curious, agitated, worried, excited… in other words, confused.

The only thing of which Éponine could be certain was that he was a very cute boy and that his strange look, full of many different emotions, made him appear bashful and very sweet.

“Can I help you?” the fourteen-year-old girl heard herself speaking.

When he heard this, the boy seemed to fall back into the real world and his extremely sweet green eyes landed on Éponine, full of surprise.

“Oh… hi! M-my name is Marius Pontmercy… My grandfather sholud’ve already been here this morning to check my luggage in…”

Éponine was completely taken aback by that. “Wait… are you going to spend this year here?”

“Well, uhm… yes…”

There was a moment of silence, during which they both looked into each other’s eyes, confused: Éponine was perplexed, while Marius seemed a little bit uncomfortable. Finally the girl took the registers and she saw that, in fact, the name of a certain Marius Pontmercy was written; besides, a Monsieur Gillenormande had already paid for him.

“Fuck! Why on Earth nobody’s informed me that we would’ve had a new student?!” said Éponine.

She was embarrassed and mortified. Marius smiled very sweetly at her and said, “Come on, nothing’s happened, really! It could’ve happened to anyone.”

If he had meant to make her feel better, his smile worked: Éponine lifted her gaze from the registers, she looked at Marius with a surprised face, she smiled at him calmly, getting more self-confident, and spoke again, “Marius Pontmercy, room 002, first floor. Oh… well, you’ll get to know your roommate straight away. Come with me: I’ll lead the way. I believe your luggage to be in the coatroom.”

The girl headed to the coatroom and felt that Marius, shyly, was following her with his gaze. When Éponine tried to lift two big suitcases, he immediately ran to help her. He took the two suitcases from her hands, leaving only a reasonable-sized carryall bag to the ground.

“Oh, no, you don’t have to! You’re a guest!” she told him, a little bit embarrassed.

“I’d never let a lady carry such a weight”, he answered, showing a gentle and gallant smile at the same time. Éponine was positively impressed by that new guest: she had to admit that boy was really something.

 

* * *

[1] Musain is the name given by Victor Hugo to the café where the revolutionaries used to meet, the Café Musain.

[2] A little homage to the musical, where Éponine is often linked to the image of the rain.


	8. First day at Saint-Denis - Marius (3)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Finally Marius is arrived at the Musain! After meeting the sweet Eponine, it's time to meet his roommate...

**_Marius_ **

Marius saw the girl smiling at him, then she lifted the carryall bag and headed towards the stairs, leading the way. Once at the end of the stairs, they turned right in a hall, leaving behind them a great, glazed room with dark wooden tables and red small couches. It wasn’t really far from Marius’s room: just some meters along the greenish wall-papered hall.

“There. This one”, said the girl, dropping down the bag to open the door. Just as she was about to pull the handle down, they heard someone calling her from downstairs. “ÉPONIIIIINE! COME DOWN AT ONCE!” It was her mother’s voice, echoing in the stairwell.

“Oh, damn them! Today they won’t let me breathe!” she said, both mortified and angry.

Marius felt like smiling to her. “Go, if you have to: I can carry everything inside by myself.”

“Are you sure? Even if I’m late by only a few minutes, surely my mother won’t die...”, she answered, while he was already moving the suitcases in order to let her pass.

“Yes, of course. Now I’m here, I don’t need any further help. Go, and thank you very much.”

“O…ok… thank you!” She smiled back at him, looking at him for some moments and then she headed to the stairs, while Marius took the bag and put it on the trolley to carry all of his luggage at the same time in the room. The boy was about to open the door when he heard her call, “Marius!”

He immediately turned around to look at her, his hand on the handle: Éponine was about to go down the first step. She smiled to him and said: “Welcome to our student house!”

Marius smiled back, he thanked her and watched as she went away. Then he cautiously pulled the handle down, getting himself ready to say hello to his new roommate.

When Marius opened the door, a thunderous noise came out from the room: inside, a shirtless boy with bushy and very dark brown curls was dancing to Good Charlotte’s ‘Last Night’; the volume was so high that Marius wondered if that boy had his eardrums still unharmed. All around him, chaos ruled the place: two big, orange suitcases were open and overturned on the bed to the right of the window in front of Marius; on the floor were scattered randomly many printed t-shirts and sweatshirts, colourful sweaters and shorts, odd socks and several pairs of underwear too, with childish patterns and bright colours. There was literally anything on that floor: a passing typhoon would have caused less damage.

“E-excuse me…” Marius was trying to do anything to catch the boy’s attention, in order to avoid that embarrassing situation, but his new roommate didn’t hear him at all, and surely his voice cringing in his throat out of shyness wasn’t helping him. When the other boy even started to sing, Marius had no other choice but to shout louder, so to be heard. “EXCUSE ME!”

When he heard him, the boy halted immediately, standing on the bed on the left of Marius, arms in the air, exactly in the position he was when he had shouted. He only turned his head to see who had interrupted him, and the newcomer could see a deep embarrassment on his face.

“Uhm… HELLO!” Marius, feeling uncomfortable due to their unusual first meeting, cautiously raised his hand as a greeting.

The other boy kept staring at him for some moments, bug-eyed, without changing that ridiculous posture at all, while the music was still filling the room. Then he turned around, lowering his arms, he looked at Marius from top to toe, he peered behind him as if he wanted to see whether there were someone else, and he shouted, “WHO ARE YOU? HOW DID YOU GET IN?”

Shouting bothered Marius, but he couldn’t do anything else. “MY NAME IS MARIUS! I’M YOUR NEW ROOMMATE!”

The boy stared at him for some more time, then he smiled very widely and jumped off the bed, heading towards the student at the door.

“WOOOOO! ÉPONINE TOLD ME I’D HAVE BEEN ALONE THIS YEAR, SO I WASN’T EXPECTING ANYBODY TO COME, REALLY!” He grabbed Marius’s hand tightly and shook it vigorously, saying, “NICE TO MEET YOU, MARIUS! MY NAME IS COURFEYRAC! I MEAN, THAT’S MY SURNAME, BUT MY FRIENDS CALL ME THAT WAY!”

Noticing that Marius was a little uncomfortable talking aloud, Courfeyrac understood that perhaps it was better if he lowered the volume of the speakers which were plugged in to his iPod.

“Better, isn’t it?” he told him smiling. That funny boy with prominent ears seemed sunny and friendly, and that inspired much confidence in Marius.

Marius, feeling more self-confident in the silence, could reciprocate the smile. “Yes, it is… thanks.”

“Oh, uhm, sorry for the mess… I wasn’t expecting visitors.” Courfeyrac took a pile of clothes from the bed prepared for Marius in his arms and he threw them randomly in a suitcase.

“Well, Marius!” he went on, grabbing a t-shirt with a print of a funny little purple alien from the little mound scattered on the ground. “Where are you from? Oh, sorry: I’ll help you carry your things inside.” He quickly put the t-shirt on, he went near Marius and took one of the two suitcases from his hands.

“Oh, thanks. Well… I’m from Paris, I’ve always studied at the nearest state school to the neighbourhood I lived in, though, east of the town. It’s my first day here at Saint Denis. Today I’ve started the course in political science”, he said, putting the suitcase on the bed.

“Ah! So you’re the new student! You’ll be in the same class of one of my friends, you know?” Courfeyrac told him, as if he’d been told by Marius the greatest news of the century. However, Marius had to admit he was surprised, too: it really was an unusual coincidence. “I’ll introduce him to you, later… supposing that he decides to show up: I’ve seen him only for a moment, today.” There was a veil of sadness in Courfeyrac’s little dark eyes, but he managed to hide it immediately.

Courfeyrac let Marius unpack and went back to tidying the mess he had left in the room. “Political science’s tough: you too’re going to be at the mercy of the feared ‘I-am-the-Law’ Javert! The nickname’s nothing special for now, but we’re working on it.”

“Who is he?” Marius asked, looking at his new roommate and stopping moving his perfectly folded clothes from the suitcase to the bed.

Courfeyrac had no time to answer, because just as he was about to tell Marius of the wicked law teacher, someone knocked on the door: two slow knocks, a short pause, then five fast beats more. It almost looked like a password.

“Gavroche! It’s open, little man! Come in!” Courfeyrac told him aloud.

From the door came a blond, curly-haired child, with quite a clever look in his eyes: to Marius, he looked like a ten-year-old kid at the most, and he wondered why that child was in a student house. Seeing Courfeyrac, the kid ran to him and he threw his arms around his neck. “Courfeyrac! I’ve missed you so much!”[1]

The boy caught him mid-air and held him tight, making him spin a few times which caused Gavroche’s legs to leave the ground, and he told him, “I’ve missed you too, munchkin!”

When Courfeyrac stopped, the kid bent his legs to be joined to his body, he put his hands on Courfeyrac’s shoulders, pushed himself back in order to look at him and said, “If you really missed me, why did you leave me here with those idiots I have for parents and those imbeciles I have to call sisters?!” He said this very quickly and very loudly, without hesitating: Marius was sure he’d never heard a child talk like that.

“You have two little brothers, too: it’s not that I’ve left you alone with them”, Courfeyrac defended himself. “And come on, Éponine and Azelma aren’t stupid!”

Gavroche widened his big blue eyes and stared at Courfeyrac in the face, saying, “Aren’t they? My whole family’s so smart that everybody forgot to fetch me home when I was at the summer camp! A nun had to take me here, it couldn’t have been more embarrassing!”

“I can barely imagine that poor thing’s face when she saw you live in such a hovel…” Courfeyrac seemed sincerely mortified as he spoke.

Gavroche punched Courfeyrac on the shoulder and went on, “You should’ve stayed here, so you could’ve picked me up! But you didn’t stay!”

“I’m sorry, Gavroche. My father and I had plans”, he said, putting the child down. He placed his hands on Gavroche’s shoulders, kneeling down, and said, “But now, I’ll stay here with you until November 1st. Even better: if you want, you can come to my place for the holidays. Mmh? How about that?”

Now Gavroche seemed calm and reassured: he remained silent for some seconds, then, smiling and happy, he said, “Yeah, why not?”

Marius was putting his clothes in the wardrobe in front of his bed, when he felt as if he was being watched. He turned around and saw Gavroche staring at him: the boy froze suddenly, staring back. Judging from his wide eyes, to Marius it looked as if the kid had realized only in that moment that there was another person in the room.

“And who’s he?” asked Gavroche, pointing at Marius with his finger.

“He’s Marius. He’s arrived today, he’s my new roommate, so you’d better treat him well!” Courfeyrac answered, hands on his sides and staring at the kid from behind him.

Gavroche turned to look at his friend with a cunning smirk, then he went to Marius, holding out his hand and introducing himself, “I’m Gavroche Thénardier, the landlords’ third-born.”

The new student shook his hand, smiling to him a little bit awkwardly: that cunning smirk was strangely disarming. Gavroche looked again at Courfeyrac, then he jumped onto Marius’s bed and kept bouncing excitedly on the mattress, producing a rusty spring noise.

“You have loads of freckles: they make your face look funny. Where are you from?” he asked Marius, still bouncing.

“Uhm…” Marius wasn’t very happy with the fact that he kept jumping on his bed: that spring noise was definitely very little reassuring. Still, he tried to be patient and answered, “I’m from Paris… it’s just that I used to go to school near my neighbourhood… which was on the other end of the town…”

“And why have you come here, now?”

Definitely an uncomfortable question: Marius went back to putting his clothes in the wardrobe, hoping of feeling less vulnerable.

“B-because my grandfather’s my guardian, now… and he wants me to attend this school… I-it’s just that he lives south of Paris, so…”

“And why’s he your guardian? Where are your parents?”

That was an even more uncomfortable question. Courfeyrac had been leaning on the desk by the window, watching the scene. Marius thought that the boy probably had noticed his discomfort, because he stepped in. “Gavroche, change subject.”

“Why?” He stopped bouncing when he saw his pretend big brother’s serious face.

“Change subject!” he repeated impatiently.

Gavroche jumped and fell again on the bed, now in a sitting position. “Do you have a girlfriend?”

“W…what?” Marius said, embarrassed, looking at the kid.

“A girlfriend, a fiancée, a sweetheart, a chick… whatever floats your boat.” Gavroche was staring at him, his eyes full of curiosity. “Do you have one?”

“Uhm… no, I don’t… I don’t have a girlfriend.”

“And why not?” Gavroche followed every single movement of Marius’s with his gaze, without looking away from him.

“Well, uhm…”

“But you’ve had one before, at least, right?” Gavroche went on, without letting him speak. He then kneeled on the bed and began peering among Marius’s clothes and among the few objects which were still in the suitcase.

“Kind of, but she wasn’t exactly my girlfr-…” Once again, Gavroche didn’t let him finish and began looking at some of his t-shirts, throwing them back into the suitcase and creasing them.

“What are you doing?” Marius asked him, confused by his action: couldn’t that kid stay still for a moment?

“If you wear this stuff, no wonder you’re alone, man!” Gavroche said. Courfeyrac felt like laughing and Marius looked at him with incredulous eyes: not because he was laughing, but because he’d never met any child similar to Gavroche. Courfeyrac didn’t say a word: he shrugged, smiling, and Marius turned towards the child, who, in the meantime, was still messing the room up. “What are these?!” Gavroche pulled out a pair of red boxers with a funny Santa print on the right and ‘Merry Christmas’ written in white letters on the back.

Marius blushed and couldn’t answer: he never wore those, what on Earth was he thinking of when he put them in the suitcase?

“I guess your supposed ex-girlfriend gave them to you as a present at Christmas, didn’t she?” Gavroche said, smiling amused.

It was evident that Courfeyrac felt like laughing, however he just exchanged a look with Marius and said, “Come on, now, Gavroche. You’ve embarrassed him enough for today. Don’t you think?”

Gavroche squinted at Courfeyrac, he huffed, throwing the boxers back in the suitcase, and said, “Alright, then!” He stood up and went to the door. “I’ll go have a bite.”

Gavroche went out of the room, but before closing the door he turned to Marius, he smiled to him and said, “Anyway, I like you!”

For a moment, Marius was a little startled. How many bizarre things had still to happen to him on that day?

“You’ll get used to him, believe me!” Courfeyrac told him, putting a hand on his shoulder.

They stayed in the room all afternoon, unpacking and chatting: Courfeyrac was a very extrovert boy and soon Marius got along well with him. He told Courfeyrac of his parents and his grandfather, and Courfeyrac did the same. They didn’t even notice the fact that, by then, it was evening.

“Holy smoke! Look what time it is!” said Courfeyrac, glancing at his phone. Then he grabbed a yellow sweatshirt he’d left on the bed and said, “The guys must be waiting for us!”

Marius was sitting at the desk, writing something on a small diary; he looked up at his roommate, confused, and said, “They’re waiting? For us?”

“Of course. You’re coming with me!”

“Oh… uhm… no, thanks.” Then Marius went back to writing.

“Oh, come on! Why?” Courfeyrac’s head emerged for a half from the sweatshirt, as if he were stuck.

“It’s not that I’m bitter, believe me. It’s just… It’s just that so many things have happened today, and I’m a little tired…”

Courfeyrac managed to put his sweatshirt on, he went nearer to Marius and told him, “You don’t need to be at your best. They’re all easygoing guys. Come on! You’ll like them!”

Marius looked up, smiling, then he turned towards the other boy and, looking at him, he said, “Did you notice you’re wearing your sweatshirt the wrong way?” The sweatshirt hood was actually on Courfeyrac’s chest, not on his back.

“Oh, yeah! Ahah! I’m always so absent-minded!” he said, putting the sweatshirt on correctly. “Come with me! Let me introduce you to the others, at least!”

Marius looked at him for a while, then he smiled resignedly and nodded.

The common room of the floor was exactly at the end of the entrance stairway: it was a big trapezoidal room, with floor-to-ceiling windows on every wall. The walls were painted with a warm, slightly orangey ochre tone, while some lamps were located between one window and the next and they lightened the room with a soft light.

When Marius and Courfeyrac entered the room, there was a crowd of students of different ages, all of them busy telling each other about their holidays and how their first school day had been. Courfeyrac walked among some of them, waving, and heading to the table in the right corner of the short side of the room where some boys had been sitting.

“Combeferre!” he called, pulling Marius by the arm.

A boy with strawberry blond hair looked up from the book he was reading and turned to face the two boys. “Ah, there you are!” he said, taking his red, thin-framed glasses off.

At the table with him there were a small boy with messy red hair, a sturdy and completely bald boy with a rather thick black stubble and a third one, more slender, with thick brown hair. They simultaneously looked up when the boy Courfeyrac had called Combeferre shut the tome to stand up and to introduce himself to the newcomer.

“Hey, who’s with you?” the red-haired boy asked, his blue eyes wide with curiosity.

“Guys, this is my new roommate, Marius Pontmercy”, Courfeyrac announced him, putting a hand on his shoulder, while Marius raised his hand awkwardly as a greeting. “Well, Marius: the know-it-owl with a book is Combeferre; the weedy one with appalling clothes is Jean Prouvaire, you can call him Jehan; the bald one’s Lesgle, but we call him Bossuet; and the pretend sickly one next to him is Joly”, Courfeyrac added, pointing at his friends one by one.

“Kn… know-it-owl?” said Marius, confused, shaking Combeferre’s hand.

“Yes: Courfeyrac always uses that nickname to mean I’m an eclectic kind of person. Your roommate has quite a limited vocabulary, Marius: you’ll notice that”, Combeferre said, almost laughing.

“Hey, that really isn’t true! It’s just that know-it-owl sounds funnier!” Courfeyrac answered in his own defence. “If I wanted to, I’d call you nerd, or brainiac!”

“Spending time with us, you’ll get aware of many things”, Bossuet said, going beside Marius and putting an arm around his shoulders. “For instance: Joly believes to suffer from any kind of existent or non-existent illness in the world...”

“...and Bossuet’s constantly in bed due to a broken bone or to the fact that he’s always the first to catch the flu during breakouts”, Joly concluded for him.

Marius felt like laughing: never had he felt so at ease with people whom he’d just met.

“Hey! Has Courfeyrac taken home a new pet?” a deep voice said from Marius’s back. A tall muscular brown-haired boy with an asymmetric haircut and a big Maori tattoo covering his whole right arm came to the table along with another boy, shorter than him, with black curly hair and a lean physique; they’d taken some packs of crisps and crackers and some bottles of beer. “I’m Bahorel, and he’s Grantaire, the village drunkard”, the tall boy introduced himself, holding out his hand.

“Marius Pontmercy. Nice to meet you”, he said, shaking it.

“Don’t be offended by what Bahorel’s said”, Grantaire told him, shaking his hand as well. “It’s just that Courfeyrac always gets to know new people as easily as a child takes a kitty or a puppy home.”

Courfeyrac put his hands on Marius’s shoulders, hiding behind him and, with puppy eyes and talking like a child, he told Bahorel, “Can we keep ‘im, daddyyyyyyy?”

“Will you stop acting like an idiot!” Bahorel said, laughing.

“Bahorel, Joly, Combeferre... why do you call each other by surname?” Marius asked, surprised.

“Oh... well, that’s quite a long story”, Bossuet answered him.

“Let’s just say for now that it was entirely Courfeyrac’s idea”, Joly added.

“Yeah, but it wasn’t entirely my idea”, Courfeyrac told Marius, as if he didn’t want taking all the credit for himself. “I’ve been prompted!”

“Right – by the way...”, Grantaire looked around, then he turned to Courfeyrac and he asked him, “And where’s our blondie?”

“He said he wanted to take a shower before coming down: he’s on his way”, he answered, pulling out a chair two seats further than where he previously had sat, just at Joly’s left. “Have a seat, Marius: tell us something about you. If you want to, of course.”

Marius had been talking of everything and anything for some time with that nice little group of boys when, from the room, some cheerful voices rose, greeting someone.

“Hey! How nice to see you again! How’s your holiday been?”

“Mmh, not too bad.”

Hearing that voice, Combeferre looked up and said calmly, “Ah! There he is!”

Marius glanced at Combeferre, then he saw Grantaire widening his eyes and standing up: he almost looked like he was thrilled. Actually, everybody, except Combeferre, looked happy and excited, while Courfeyrac raised his hand to gesture to someone that they were sitting at that table.

Marius turned around to see who was coming and he saw a boy in a white t-shirt covered by a wide, red cardigan, and loose jeans. He had long, blond hair tied up in a low ponytail and wonderful blue eyes. Not until that boy got nearer did Marius realize that he’d already met him.

“Hey, guys!” the blond boy called out.

“Enjolras! It was quite time!” said Bahorel.

“It’s so nice to see you again!” Jehan added, running to him for a hug.

Enjolras seemed to let Jehan hug him, then he said, “I’m happy to see you all again, too.”

Courfeyrac stood up from his chair, making Marius stand up also, and said, “You’ve already met Marius Pontmercy, haven’t you?”

Enjolras and Marius looked into each other’s eyes and recognized each other. Enjolras seemed surprised. He smiled and said, “Of course: you’re the boy who’s arrived today! At last we get to know one another properly. Nice to meet you. Enjolras.” Saying that, he held out his hand and Marius shook it, smiling back.

Marius looked at him for some moments. He’d always said that he wasn’t able to judge male beauty; however, in that case, looking better at him, he had no doubt. Enjolras was really the most beautiful boy he had ever met.

  


* * *

[1] A little homage to Tom Hooper’s movie (2012), in which Courfeyrac behaves like a big brother towards Gavroche.


	9. First day at Saint-Denis - Enjolras

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> And finally Enjolras comes in the common room, so the group met! But why is he stayed in his room during the afternoon? How many secrets does he keep?

**_Enjolras_ **

As they talked, Bossuet had gone to fetch a chair from the nearby table, so that Enjolras too could sit together with them.

“We’ve been waiting for you all day long. Since when do you play hard to get, blondie?” Bahorel said, sipping his beer directly from the bottle.

“It’s not that I wanted to play hard to get: I had several things to do, so I’ve been a little bit in a hurry, that’s all”, Enjolras answered him, sitting down between Combeferre and Courfeyrac; that had been his place for almost two years, now.

“But why haven’t you come straight to us? Don’t you care for us anymore?” Jehan was looking at him with his two big eyes from his seat on the other side of Combeferre, as if he were a beaten-up puppy: the two of them had been in the same class for two years, and one could have said that Enjolras had been his only true friend among their classmates, therefore he knew that the minute boy had grown particularly fond of him.

“I do! Don’t say such a thing!” Enjolras exclaimed immediately. “You know that’s not true! I just had a lot of things to do and, knowing that I’d have seen you all this evening, I gave priority to the rest.” Enjolras wasn’t a sentimental boy, yet he knew perfectly well that he had to behave the sweetest he could with Jehan. He noticed that the others wanted to know what he had been up to all day long, locked up alone in his room, but he didn’t feel like saying anything. That wasn’t new: Enjolras was very discreet, especially about his past. Nobody knew anything about him, apart from the fact that he was the only child of a very prestigious family. He never talked either of his parents, or of what he used to do before meeting the others: only Combeferre and partly Courfeyrac knew what was hidden behind those eyes, always rapt in a thousand thoughts.

Enjolras looked at Combeferre for a few seconds, trying to make him understand with a single look that the other guys’ curiosity was upsetting him: he didn’t feel like talking about that matter. Combeferre was a sort of a right-hand man to him: Enjolras knew that he would’ve understood without asking anything. As expected, Combeferre nodded and came to help him, changing the subject of conversation with a readiness worth of his intelligence. “If you’re a classmate of Enjolras’s, it means you’re studying political science too, Marius.”

Marius, plainly confused by what had just happened, seemed to fall from the sky when Combeferre spoke to him. “Uh? Oh, yeah... yes, exactly.”

Enjolras took one of the Coca Cola cans which Bahorel and Grantaire had provided specifically for him, since the slender boy refused to drink alcohol. As he opened it, he looked at Marius and asked him, “Why did you choose political science?”

Marius stayed silent for a moment before answering, “Because I often get to hear about unjustly accused innocents and about criminals who are absolved in spite of the truth being under everyone’s eyes... I’d like to become a judge, so that I’ll be able to limit this injustice. I may not be able to change the world, but I want to do my part.”

Everyone looked at him in silence, drifting then their gazes onto Enjolras, who was sincerely pleased with what he had just heard. The boy exchanged a look with Combeferre and Courfeyrac, who both smiled back to him, then he looked at Marius and said, “If you really think so, it seems to me that we’re going to get along well!”

“Attention! Freedom paladin mode on!” Courfeyrac announced to Marius with a strange gesture of his hands, as to mimic a switch being turned on.

Enjolras stared at him in silence, speechless, then he said, “I had no intention to say anything at all, Courfeyrac!”

“Well, let’s be honest: when we talk about justice, peace and freedom you immediately spring up!” Bahorel pointed out. “If you think of one of those horrendous jack-in-the-boxes, they resemble you very closely, I guess!”

Enjolras thought that he heard Grantaire whisper ‘A worthy child of France!’. The blond boy shifted his gaze from Bahorel to Grantaire, who was sitting in front of him, and he saw him smiling while staring at his already half-empty second bottle of beer.

He wasn’t sure of what he’d heard, but he decided not to get distracted, so he answered, “I’ve chosen political science because I believe in these values and because I’m sure that it is possible to put them into practice: we’d just have to learn to be more selfless. If everyone were like that, the world would be a better place!”

“So you...” Marius took part in the discourse a little gingerly, “you’ve chosen political science... precisely to become a politician?”

“Uh... terrible mistake... on with the rant, now!” said Bossuet in a hushed tone, placing his head on one hand in despair, even if Enjolras saw that he was about to laugh.

“I would say I’ve chosen political science to be able to make a difference. Too many things would have to be changed, but no one, up there at the top, moves a finger to do anything. They’ve eased themselves down on their soft little armchairs and they ignore that the government can’t work like that. On the other hand, others are always complaining, but they don’t do anything tangible to improve things!”

“What was I saying? Here’s our freedom paladin!” Courfeyrac smiled to Marius, putting a hand on Enjolras’s shoulder.

“Alright, alright! I won’t talk anymore!” Enjolras surrendered, raising his hands.

“No, Enjolras! Don’t be offended…” Jehan began to speak, but he didn’t have time to finish since Courfeyrac interrupted him.

“Aaaah! Such a luck for our ears!” the prominent-eared boy said, raising his arms as a sign of freedom to make a little fun of Enjolras and soften the tension.

Getting the teasing, Enjolras answered, “Tsk! Look who’s talking! We’d all pay cash not to hear you babble twenty-four-seven!”

“What are you talking about! I don’t talk that much!” Courfeyrac tried to defend himself.

“Don’t you?!” Bahorel said, ironical. “We hear you talk even at night! I don’t understand just how you don’t ever lose your voice!”

“Ah-ah! Aren’t you the soul of comedy! Should we talk about you, Mr. ‘Harassing Snoring’?” Courfeyrac said, pointing an accusatory finger towards him but still acting like a joker. Enjolras seemed to have calmed down, when he noticed he was observed: he instinctively looked up towards Grantaire, who, pretending that nothing had happened, drew his gaze away from Enjolras and joined the conversation. “You actually snore like hell, Bahorel”, the dark and curly-haired boy told him, leaning on the seatback of the chair and taking another sip of his bottle of beer. “We’ve been sharing the same room for only four years, but I’d say they’re enough to tell just how loud you snore!”

“You’re not exactly silent, too, R!” Bahorel accused him, ruffling his hair. “And if a man doesn’t snore, what kind of a man is he?”

“Oh… can’t I define myself as a man, then?” Jehan asked, clutching his Coca Cola can with both hands. Bahorel, who was sitting beside him, carefully observed him. Enjolras knew what Bahorel was thinking: Jehan was sixteen, he looked like a little girl and he hadn’t even changed his voice yet: how could he think that he was a man?

“Don’t listen to him, he often speaks with his brain turned off”, Enjolras said in order to help Bahorel. He and Combeferre knew every one of the guys like the back of their hands and, by then, they could understand and foresee every reaction of their friends. Enjolras knew that Bahorel found easier talking to him than to Jehan, despite the fact that the two boys had the same age.

“You say so just because you don’t snore either, blondie! Am I right?” Bahorel said, pointing at him with the bottle.

“Maybe you are, maybe not. Either way, you’ll never know!” was Enjolras’s answer.

“Combefeeeeeerre!” Bahorel turned to the boy’s roommate speaking with a singsong voice, hoping for an answer.

“It’s not yours to know”, he answered him, taking one of the potato crisps which Bahorel and Grantaire had taken there earlier from the kitchen.

“Man, you’re such a drag!” Bahorel mock-pouted and crossed his arms. “Change the sentence, at least! You can’t just answer ‘It’s not yours to know’ every time you want to sneak out of an uncomfortable discourse!”

“It won’t work”, Combeferre warned him. “I’m not going to betray him.”

“King Arthur and his loyal knight, sir Lancelot!” Courfeyrac exclaimed, standing up and stretching his arm out before him, as if he were holding a long sword.

The others all looked confused; Enjolras said, “What are you… talking about?”

“Aw, come on, look at us!” Courfeyrac started to explain. “Everyone sitting here, at this round table, he’s saying that he’s not going to betray you… it all looks a lot like ‘King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table’!”

“You are aware of the fact that, in the end, Lancelot becomes Queen Guinevere’s lover and throws Arthur into a state of despair, therefore causing the entire kingdom of Camelot to crumble to pieces, aren’t you?” Combeferre said, squinting his eyes at him.

Courfeyrac stayed still and silent for a couple of seconds, as if he didn’t know that, then he looked at Combeferre and said, “Didn’t Lancelot sacrifice himself to prevent his death?”

“Courfeyrac… we’ve already been there…” Combeferre said with a sigh. “The TV show ‘Merlin’ is not King Arthur’s original story, ok?”

“Oh… what a shame. I was already thinking to play the role of Merlin, I liked that!” Courfeyrac answered, almost disappointed.

“Oh, no! Combeferre’s a lot more suited to be Merlin than you are!” Jehan said, excited by the fact that the conversation was about something he knew well. “He’s wise and he knows a lot of things, and you aren’t like that at all… no offence intended!”

“Of course… why, I’m not offended at all!” Courfeyrac said, even if he’d been clearly offended a little bit.

“Enjolras’s the perfect Arthur!” Jehan went on. “He’s our leader, after all, and, like Arthur, he cares a lot about equality! Courfeyrac, you’d be Lancelot, who was actually the most loyal of Arthur’s knights – except for that final treachery, of course…”

“Nah! There wouldn’t be such risk with Enjolras! He’s never fallen in love!” Bossuet teased him, while putting an arm around Joly and looking at him. Actually, Enjolras almost couldn’t understand what sense there could ever be in romanticism, and from time to time he thought to be nothing else but allergic to it. Right then, however, seeing Joly and Bossuet exchange signs of affection, he strangely felt like smiling: he was aware of how much they’d been missing each other and he wouldn’t have stopped them.

“Oh, crap!” exclaimed Joly when his gaze landed on Bossuet’s wristwatch. He took his left arm, which the bald boy had on the table, so to draw it nearer; he slightly shifted himself closer to his boyfriend’s face to tell the time better, and then he said, “It’s already past dinnertime!”

“What! Already?” said Courfeyrac. On instinct, everyone checked the time, some on the phone, some others on the wristwatches.

“Uhm… fine… who’s cooking?” Enjolras said, looking his friends in the eye one by one. No one answered: the previous school year, Feuilly had taken care of that kind of problem. Now that he wasn’t living there anymore, Enjolras was already thinking that he would’ve had to arrange cooking shifts in addition to those already in use for the washing-up.

“We could always go out”, Grantaire suggested.

“Knowing the time, it gets difficult finding a place around here where to go”, Joly said, looking again at Bossuet’s watch. “Going far’s not convenient, either, since we could be forced to go home on foot. It’s already nine p.m., all in all.”

“Excuse me…”, Marius tried to suggest, “there’s the hotel restaurant just downstairs… couldn’t we go there?” The guys laughed, with no intention to be mean, though.

“It’s plain to tell you’re new and you haven’t tried madame Thénardier’s cuisine yet!” Enjolras calmly told him. “Tonight is meatloaf night, and I wouldn’t advise my worst enemy either to eat that, trust me!”

“Why? Is it really so awful?” Marius asked.

“Oh no, not at all! It’s actually tasty and spicy when you try it”, Courfeyrac explained, leaning with his elbow on Marius’s shoulder. “However, once, a couple of years ago, Enjolras and I were chasing Gavroche’s cat and we ended up in the kitchen, right during meatloaf night. We tripped behind the counter next to the service door, therefore she didn’t spot us…” Courfeyrac’s voice got grave, as if he were about to tell a ghost story, and he went on, “We saw her clearly from behind there, though. It’s impossible to describe what we saw: there’s anything and everything in that meatloaf!”

Enjolras felt the urge to smile when he observed Marius, who was looking at Courfeyrac with shocked eyes.

“What… what’s inside there?” the newcomer asked, keeping his eyes fixed on Courfeyrac’s grim face.

“Well”, the other boy spoke again, “nobody knows. But I’ll tell you just this: after we saw that sludge coming out of the meat grinder, we found the cat… with no tail![1]” Marius’s eyes went wide with shock, and Courfeyrac went on, “Enjolras and I didn’t touch any food for two days after that adventure.”

“And after they told us, we haven’t gone to that restaurant anymore”, Joly concluded. “Cat’s tail in one’s food… besides being disgusting, it’s not hygienic either!”

Bossuet leaned forward, beyond Joly, he looked at Marius’s eyes which were wide for the shock, and he took charge of the situation; he was basically suffocating as he strived not to laugh, yet he managed to change subject, “Why don’t we order some pizzas, instead?”

“It could be an idea”, Enjolras supported him. Then he stood up and told the others, “Who’s for?” Once having verified that there was unanimous vote, Enjolras went to fetch a notepad, a pen and a phone book; giving notepad and pen to Combeferre, he said, “Fine: Combeferre, please take note of which pizzas the guys want.” He handed the phone book to Grantaire and he told him, “Grantaire, have a look if there’s a pizzeria you know which you could ask to make us a good price. I’ll go set the table.”

Everyone immediately surrounded Combeferre, telling him which pizza they wanted, except Grantaire, who was browsing the phone book, and Marius, who was waiting for his turn, shyly.

“Jeez, let me breathe! Well, let’s see: Courfeyrac, the usual, with peppers; Bahorel, onion and sausage; Bossuet and Joly, ham pizza…”

“I’ll come help you!” Jehan said, standing up to join Enjolras in the kitchen. He stopped in front of Combeferre, smiling sweetly, and said to him, “For me, a pizza with vegetables, thanks.”

“Right away. What about you, Enjolras?” Combeferre called towards the kitchen.

“Simply tomato and mozzarella, don’t worry!” was the shout that came as answer: from the kitchen, Enjolras could still hear the others’ voices quite clearly.

“And for you, Marius?”

“A margherita for me, too, thank you very much.”

“Marius seems to be nice, doesn’t he?” When he heard someone speaking to him, Enjolras turned around abruptly and saw Jehan coming in the kitchen.

“Yeah. He looks like a good guy”, Enjolras answered him, going back to looking for a clean tablecloth in the old counter drawer next to the oven. Once the tablecloth was found, the blond leader laid it on the table and let Jehan pass him the cutlery in silence; they could hear Grantaire trying to convince the worker of a certain ‘Pizzeria Rialto’ to make him a good price.

Then Jehan spoke again, “I-I was thinking…”

“What?” Enjolras asked roughly, without turning around.

Jehan gulped and went on, completely red because of his shyness, “I-I was thinking that we could include him into the group… you know, he’s your classmate, and he sleeps in the same room as Courfeyrac… In this way, it won’t be long before he… uhm… gets familiar with the place…”

“It sounds like a good idea to me”, the other boy interrupted him, still setting the table. “I’ll tell him later: I’ll manage everything, don’t worry.”

Jehan was more relaxed, now: he stayed silent, looking at Enjolras, then he smiled and exclaimed, happy, “Wonderful!” After that, silence fell again. Jehan was still staring at him, almost as if he were worried. “Enjolras?”

“Yes?”

“Is-is there something wrong? Are you sad?” Hearing those words, Enjolras stilled. Yes, he was sad, but he didn’t feel like talking about it, especially not to Jehan: he would’ve probably saddened him too much.

He tried to smile the most sincerely he could and turned around to reassure his friend. “No. Everything’s fine, really!”

 

The evening was spent among laughs and past anecdotes; thanks to them, the group could start getting to know Marius, and vice versa. Bedtime came before they noticed it. The first ones to go away were Joly and Bossuet, who both immediately ran to their room because Joly couldn’t risk missing his precious eight-hours sleep, and Jehan, who went to his small room to read a little. The others stayed there talking for several more minutes, until they noticed it was almost midnight already, so they went to their rooms in their turn. Bahorel and Grantaire’s room was next to Marius and Courfeyrac’s, right at the first end of the hall; by contrast, Combeferre and Enjolras’s was on the other end, the farthest, so they bid goodnight there in the common room.

Combeferre was the second to enter and he closed the door with Enjolras already shirtless, ready to put a large and long t-shirt on – that was his pajamas. Combeferre started undressing, too. Like every night, Éponine had already lit the two bedside lamps and in the room there was a soft light, just barely enlightening their faces.

“There’s something you haven’t told me, isn’t there?” Combeferre asked him, unbuttoning his shirt.

“What do you mean?” Enjolras asked back, pulling his jeans off under the long, dark blue t-shirt.

“Come on, Enjolras! I’ve learnt to know you well enough to tell you’re hiding something from me. A glimpse’s enough for me by now.” Combeferre stood there, staring at him, his shirt half-unbuttoned.

Enjolras looked into his eyes for some seconds, then he sighed, he sat on his bed and, taking his socks off, he said, “I hate being like an open book to you!”

Enjolras threw the socks to the ground, fisting his hands on his knees and bowing his head, aware of the fact that Combeferre was watching him. When he was among other people, Enjolras was constantly proud and self-confident: he always walked tall and he never showed to be in distress. However, when he and Combeferre were alone, that superhuman halo surrounding him every moment of the day seemed to abandon him under the weight of tiredness, and he would turn human again, showing all of his hidden frailties.

Combeferre went near him, he kneeled before the blondie so to look at him in the face, he put his hands on Enjolras’s shoulders and he told him, smiling sweetly, “You want to talk about it?” Enjolras knew that Combeferre could foresee the answer, but he’d imagined he would’ve asked him nonetheless.

He just smiled back and told him, “ It’s late, now: we’d better go to bed… tomorrow, perhaps.”

Combeferre gazed at him with a doubtful, almost sad look: that ‘tomorrow, perhaps’ meant that he would have never told him for real, and Enjolras was sure Combeferre was well aware of that. He realized Combeferre was very worried, so Enjolras took his hands, he smiled sincerely and said, “You’re my best friend: believe me when I say that, if I need to talk to you about that, I’ll do it. You’re always sweet and patient to me... and I appreciate that, believe me... but I don’t feel like it for now: I’m just asking you to respect my decision and to be patient a little while longer, please...”

To Enjolras, it was very strange staying there like that, his hands on his friend’s: the blond boy didn’t like touching or being touched, and when he was too close to a person he felt embarrassed – often even distressed. With Combeferre, though, it was different: the strawberry blond-haired boy didn’t mask his emotions like he did, and Enjolras was therefore used to him showing his affection towards him to the point that, from time to time, the blond let himself go in his presence.

Combeferre kept looking at him for some more seconds, then he sighed and he lowered his hands, shaking his head and saying, “Alright: I don’t want to force you into telling me anything if you don’t feel like it, I have no right to do so. But you know my opinion about that.”

“Yes, I do know: I should vent from time to time because if I go on keeping everything inside myself I’ll end up bursting”, Enjolras said, almost in a singsong voice: Combeferre had told him that a million times at least.

“Don’t do that, I’m telling this for your own good!”

Enjolras couldn’t help but smile, seeing that Combeferre was so attached to him that he even discussed with him. He put a hand on his shoulder, the other one reaching to move a lock of strawberry blond hair away from his forehead, and he placed a kiss there. “I’m well aware of that, and I thank you”, he told him. “But really, I’m alright. Go to sleep and don’t you fret about me.”

Combeferre stood up and went on undressing in order to get in his pajamas. Enjolras crept under the sheets and freed his long hair from the hair tie. Once he was finished, Combeferre too crept under the sheets of his own bed and he immediately turned the lights off. Then, looking at Enjolras, he said, “I’m not going to sleep at all because of your stubbornness! I’ll be concerned about you all night long!”

Enjolras was ruffling his hair a bit to untie possible knots; he turned towards Combeferre and, almost laughing, he said, “I don’t think so!”

Combeferre frowned at him, then he leaned onto the pillow, laying on his side and facing the centre of the room. As soon as his head hit the pillow, Enjolras took the alarm clock on his bedstand and whispered, “Three... two... one...” He looked up and called, “Combeferre? You hear me?”

No answer came; as he expected, Combeferre had already drifted into dreamland. “Just like clockwork! I was right to say that you wouldn’t have stayed awake!” he said, putting the clock down. Then he stood up and got quietly out of the room, he went to room 005 and he cautiously opened the door: as expected, Jehan, who had asked to have a single room because he was used to sleep alone when he was at home, had fallen asleep all snuggled up on his side while reading.

Patiently, Enjolras lifted his head up and pulled the book away, paying attention not to close it before having put the bookmark inside; he lifted his legs and he covered him with the bedspread, then he took Jehan’s teddy bear and he put it in his arms; finally, he stood up and switched the ligths off. He did that every night since he’d discovered that Jehan was used to fall asleep while reading, but that didn’t bother him. He went back to bed, hoping to get some sleep: Enjolras was always the last one of his friends to fall asleep, and sometimes he would stay awake for whole hours in bed, motionless and pondering.

That wasn’t one of those nights: facing the wall, a hand under the pillow, he stayed for several minutes absorbed in his very tormenting thoughts; then he thought of his friends, who were like a family to him and who were there with him. He managed to fall asleep serenely, thinking that tomorrow could’ve only been a better day.

 

 

 

**_–_ ** **_End chapter 1 –_ **

  


* * *

[1] Reference to the musical, in which the Thénardiers, during Master of the House, sing, “Food beyond compare - Food beyond belief - Mix it in a mincer - And pretend it's beef - Kidney of a horse - Liver of a cat - Filling up the sausages - With this and that”. In the film version, they actually put these things in a meat grinder.


	10. Beware the shark! - Enjolras

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's the second school's day. It's time to wake up and go to school, but it seems that Combeferre doesn't want to wake today... as usual!

**_Enjolras_ **

The first thing Enjolras heard that morning was the sound of his alarm clock.

– **_I raise my flags, don my clothes, It's a revolution, I suppose, We'll paint it red to fit right iiiiiin, whoooooa_** ** _–_**

As he heard his mobile phone ringing, he turned around, still half-asleep, and he tried to switch it off, leaning on his right arm and reaching out with the left one.

– **_I'm waking up, I feel it in my boooones. Love to make my systems gooo. Welcome to the new age, to the new age. Welcome to the new age, to the n_** ** _…_** ** _–_**

Switched off, at last. Then he glanced at the old alarm clock on the nightstand as if he wanted to be really sure of the time, although he knew perfectly well that it was 7.30 a.m. That old clock wasn’t late by a second, as Éponine often checked it so that it would work perfectly. However, Enjolras refused to use it at all: he’d only tried it once, and, that morning, the unbearable din of the hammer beating on the two rusty bells had made that awakening the worst the boy had ever had in his life. The fact which had surprised him the most, that time, was that Combeferre hadn’t noticed a thing; only later he learnt that even an earthquake wouldn’t wake his roommate up.

As expected, Combeferre hadn’t heard the alarm that morning too, and he was still sleeping in the exact posture in which Enjolras remembered he’d fallen asleep. The first times, Enjolras even wondered if Combeferre had died in his sleep, but by now he was used to it. He sat up on the bed, stretching out and rubbing his eyes. He looked for some moments towards the window: the light filtering from the spaces in the still closed shutters warmed his face, giving him a very pleasant feeling. He glanced once more at the clock: five minutes had already passed, so he stood up and he immediately went to the bathroom to tidy himself up.

Once he’d tied his hair in the usual low ponytail, he went back in the room and looked at Combeferre: it was quite time to wake him up. He rolled his sleeves up and prepared for action: who knows how much time it would’ve taken him, that morning!

Firstly, Enjolras opened the shutters, letting the high, eastern sun into the room violently, but Combeferre didn’t move. Then he decided to try and shake him. “Combeferre? Combeferre! Come on, it’s getting late! Please, wake up!” Still nothing. He also tried putting some music on, raising his voice, taking the sheets away from him, making some noise by moving objects and slamming the wardrobe doors: no reaction, not even a grunt. Finally, Enjolras decided to go for desperate measures: he took the glass containing toothpaste and toothbrushes, he emptied it, filled it with icy cold water, he went to Combeferre, he sat next to him and *SPLASH*, he threw all of the water straight in his face.

“AH! WHAT THE FUCK, ENJOLRAS!” At last, Combeferre was awake. “It was frozen! Why on Earth did you do that?”

“I didn’t mean to be so drastic, but you wouldn’t wake up!” Enjolras said, explaining himself.

“I understand, but was it really necessary to throw water in my face?!”

“I’ve been trying to wake you up for fifteen minutes, I didn’t know what else to come up with.”

“Fifteen minutes! Well, don’t exaggerate!” Combeferre answered, groggy, drying his face and his strawberry blond hair on the sheets. Enjolras didn’t speak: he just looked at his friend with incredulous eyes, he stood up and he handed him the clock to show him the time. Combeferre turned to him and he looked at the old clock: he tried to tell the time, squinting his eyes to see better, and once he’d succeeded he looked embarrassed, almost as if he was feeling guilty. “Oh... well. Uhm... since at 7.30 you’re always out of bed... I guess that maybe it really took you fifteen minutes”, he said, giving the clock back to him. “This doesn’t excuse you, though! There are less barbaric manners by far, you know!”

“Well”, Enjolras spoke, taking the clock back to its place, “the bright side is that you don’t have to wash your face! This’ll make you save some time!” he concluded, smiling at him.

Combeferre looked at him for several seconds, speechless out of nervousness, as if he wanted to strangle him, but then, seeing his friend smiling, he felt like laughing. “That actually makes sense!”

Enjolras started to dress himself when he turned to look at Combeferre and saw that he was about to hit the pillow again. “Don’t you dare laying down again!” he immediately told him with an angry voice.

“Alright, alright. I’m up.” That said, Combeferre got up and went to the bathroom under Enjolras’s strict and alarmed look; the blond boy was motionless, staring at him. “Just get dressed and go have breakfast, don’t worry. If I’m not coming, you’ll be allowed to let me here.”

Without looking away, Enjolras answered him, “You know I couldn’t let you here, knowing how important having classes is to you!”

“Yeah, of course I know. I know you well! But I won’t lay in bed again, really!” he heard speaking from the bathroom. Hearing no answer, Combeferre popped his head out of the bathroom, he looked at Enjolras, smiling, and said, “I promise!” Enjolras decided to trust him: he knew perfectly that Combeferre never had, nor would have broken a promise he’d made. He buttoned his red trousers, grabbed a grey shirt and went out of the room. The coffee scent was spreading through the first floor halls as Enjolras headed to the kitchen. The others were all already sitting at the usual table in the corner, enjoying their breakfast.

“Ah! Good morning, blond leader!” Courfeyrac exclaimed as he saw him entering the room; everybody turned to greet him, some with a cheerful ‘good morning’, some others simply with a nod. “Waking the know-it-owl up has been a tough job today, hasn’t it?” he added, patting slightly with his hand on the empty chair next to him, as if hinting to Enjolras to sit there.

“Today’s been hellish… it gets worse and worse every time, as if his organism grew antibodies against my awakening methods…” Enjolras answered while sitting down, exasperated. It wasn’t even 8.00 a.m. and yet he already felt exhausted.

Marius leaned forward, popping out from behind Courfeyrac to look at Enjolras, and he asked him, “Did you sleep well? You look tired…”

Enjolras was surprised by that question, but he was happy that Marius was concerned for him. “Not more than usual. I only need a couple of minutes to wake up properly, don’t worry!” he answered him smiling.

“Actually, your face’s a lot more worn out than usual”, Bahorel noticed, one arm on the chair seatback and his other hand holding his habitual coffee mug. Courfeyrac stared at Bahorel for a moment, then he turned to Enjolras – who was filling his red mug with some hot water, meanwhile – and he leaned towards his face, gazing at it for some seconds at a close distance, as if he were looking for something very tiny.

“What… what are you doing?” Enjolras felt the need to ask, stopping suddenly from pouring the water, feeling completely uncomfortable because of the sudden closeness of his friend’s face: he had no problem at all with Courfeyrac, but he felt embarrassed by the fact that he was being stared at up close.

“Uhm…” was the only thing Courfeyrac said; he was silent for some more moments, then he added, “It seems to me that he’s got his usual tired face like every morning, Bahorel! Nothing new!”

It took a while to the incredulous Enjolras to find the words to speak. “Did you need to come this close to ascertain that?” Then he heard Bossuet giggling and he turned towards him: he saw him leaning on the chair, his right arm on Joly’s chair seatback. “What is it?” was all he managed to ask.

“Nothing! I’m just amused by the fact that you get embarrassed by the slightest things!” he answered, giggling on. “Nothing’s happened, after all.” Then he took a sip of piping hot coffee, but it was brief and followed by a slight moan, his mouth closed.

“My, haven’t you scorched your tongue again, have you?!” Joly asked, turning his head to him and keeping his elbows on the table while holding with both hands his _Doctor Who_ mug on which it was printed ‘Trust me, I’m a doctor!’.

“Ah-ha! It hurts a bit!” he answered, pointing at his tongue.

“It’s the same old story every morning on which you drink coffee: can’t you wait for it to cool down?” Saying this, Joly patiently poured some orange juice in his boyfriend’s glass: one could tell it was freshly squeezed just by looking at it.

“But I like my coffee hot…” Bossuet said, looking at Joly as a puppy reprimanded by his masters. Holding the glass out, Joly was looking at him with stern, almost exasperated eyes, but it didn’t take long before he felt like smiling.

For a moment, Enjolras felt as if someone had been staring at him and, by instinct, his attention drifted from the lovebirds to Grantaire, who was sitting between them and Bahorel. It seemed to him that he’d looked away, coming back to the slice of bread on which he was spreading some Nutella: to Enjolras, that morning Grantaire appeared to be somewhat distracted, but he had a sweet smile on his face. Therefore, maybe there wasn’t anything to worry about… or maybe there was?

He didn’t have time to ask him anything, however, since Grantaire turned to Jehan, who was sitting next to Bahorel as well, and he told him, “Jehan, aren’t you going a little bit too far with sugaring your tea?” Enjolras noticed that it was already the third generous spoonful of sugar the small boy was pouring in his low porcelain cup, painted with little pink flowers.

“I can’t help it… I like it sweet!” Jehan answered, smiling innocently.

“Try not to overdo it: too much sugar isn’t good for your health”, Combeferre backed Grantaire up with all the sweetness he could, putting a hand on Jehan’s shoulder; the others greeted him and he took a seat at Enjolras’s free side.

Enjolras tried again to speak to Grantaire, but his attention was caught by Courfeyrac who stretched an arm right under his nose at that same moment to grab what looked like his fourth small block of butter – judging from the little paper envelops opened next to his mug, which was printed with funny aliens and full to the brim with milk and Nesquik. “Oh, hi, know-it-owl!”

“Isn’t there too much chocolate in your milk?” Combeferre remarked, taking the cornflakes box from the centre of the table and looking straight into Courfeyrac’s mug.

“I’d say the true question is, how the heck can you eat such a large amount of butter?! You could feel sick!” Joly told him, horrified, cleaning Bossuet’s shirt – his boyfriend had made sure to stain it with hot coffee.

“Let him! He can’t stand still to the point that he just sweats everything off immediately!” Bahorel defended him, pointing at him, mug in hand.

“That doesn’t count for you, though”, Joly remarked, staring at the dish full of brioches and bread-and-butter slices next to Bahorel’s arm. “How do you account for that… mountain of fats and sugars on your dish?”

Bahorel glanced briefly at his breakfast, then he looked at Joly again, he shrugged and, quite pleased with himself, he said, “I can!”

Enjolras was almost sure of having seen Marius from the corner of the eye making a weird expression as his eyes examined Bahorel, like he meant ‘well, he’s got a point’. Joly looked at Bahorel, shocked, and he answered, “That’s like a live-broadcast suicide! You’re going to burst if you keep eating that stuff!”

“Ah, come on! I can eat all of this stuff just like Jehan can drink sugary tea!”

Joly then drifted his gaze onto Jehan, who was still busy filling his teacup with large spoonfuls of sugar. He then looked back at Bahorel. “It’ll be bad for him. You mustn’t spoil him!”

“What spoiling and spoiling?!” Bahorel said, almost laughing. “My argument is simple: if one can’t even enjoy breakfast in peace, we’ve hit the rock bottom!”

“Well, you can’t argue with that!” Courfeyrac said, biting his slice of bread and butter. Enjolras noticed that, while they were discussing, Courfeyrac had added some strawberry jam… plenty of strawberry jam.

“Honestly, I’m worried for your liver, too, but I’d say that’s your problem, guys, not mine.” That said, Combeferre went back to slowly munching his cornflakes.

“Blasht, you doctorsh-to-be’re shuch a bore!” Courfeyrac said, his mouth full of food. He then gulped with some difficulty and added, “What do you think about it, Enjolras?”

Enjolras was surprised by the fact that Courfeyrac had addressed the question to him. Why was he asking _him_? It was a miracle in itself that he was managing to drink all of his tea and to eat a couple of cookies: how could he agree with Courfeyrac? “Don’t make me intervene”, he just said, going back to sipping his tea. “I’m not interested in the matter.”

“Why! Defender of the people’s liberty! You can’t forsake me like that!” Enjolras thought that Courfeyrac had grasped that it wasn’t exactly a good day for him, because he didn’t insist any further. The two boys were close friends: by then, both could tell what was going through the other’s mind just with a glance. Then, having looked into each other’s eyes for some moments, Courfeyrac turned to Marius. “What do you think, then?”

Enjolras realized that Marius was quite lost in his thoughts, since he kept stirring the milk in his bowl with the spoon, clockwise, not even noticing that Courfeyrac was talking to him. He glanced at Combeferre and saw that he too had sensed that something was wrong. As always, he didn’t need to say a word: they both gave a nod of the head to one another and Combeferre looked at his wristwatch, trying to stop the conversation. Then he realized what time it was and exclaimed, “Blimey! It’s late!”

Enjolras grabbed Combeferre’s arm and he looked at the time: it was already 8:15. “Shit! We’ve got to get going or we’ll be late!” he said, standing up. As he did so, everyone followed him, heading to their rooms to fetch schoolbags and rucksacks in order to go and face the school day. It was then that Marius seemed to wake up from his trance and he looked around in confusion; Enjolras went behind him and he put a hand on his shoulder, then moving to be beside him, and he smiled to him. “Are you coming?”

The sun was shining bright and warm that September day, and there was much bustle in the neighbourhood at the north of Paris: the birds were chirping and chased one another among the gardens trees, while many people crowded the sidewalks, filling the streets with their cars headed to work or school.

As they walked to school, Enjolras stayed back to be the last in the group with Marius and Jehan. From there he could see Joly and Bossuet walk hand in hand, Bahorel and Grantaire talk away about something he couldn’t hear and Courfeyrac tug at Combeferre as if he were asking him something; every once in a while he ran to the others, but the blond leader of the group couldn’t understand what for. Enjolras looked at Jehan who was walking happy and watching at one time the few white clouds running across the sky, at the other the plants popping out from the fences. Then he drifted his gaze onto Marius and he saw that he was still distracted: he couldn’t tell whether that was just because he was tired or because there was something wrong.

“So, Marius”, he spoke, placing a hand right on Marius’s shoulder, “how’s your first night at the house been?”

Marius turned towards him and he gave him the typical look of a person who’s not sure whether to laugh or to cry. Enjolras understood that he didn’t know what to say: he thought that probably Marius was still a little uncomfortable with talking to him, and of course, he couldn’t blame him – after all, they’d introduced themselves only the night before. Trying to reassure him, he added, smiling, “Answer frankly! Nobody’s going to be offended if you say it was bad!”

It seemed to work, because Marius answered, “Well, uhm… I thought you were joking yesterday evening, when you said Courfeyrac talks twenty-four-seven…”

Enjolras wasn’t surprised at all; he already began giggling, without hiding that he was somewhat sorry for Marius, though, and then he added, “What did he do, this time?”

Marius told Enjolras and Jehan that, that night, he’d fallen asleep peacefully in the silence of the room, but then, in the dead of the night, he’d suddenly snapped awake because he’d heard Courfeyrac speaking: “I am not a Frankenstein… I’m a Frankensteen!” He told that he’d turned to face him, in order to see whether he was sleeping or just raving or something. After some seconds of silence he’d heard his roommate speak again, with louder voice, “Don’t give me that! I don’t believe in fate! Destiny… Destiny!” Marius also remembered that, saying so, Courfeyrac had started writhing until, suddenly, he’d begun throwing the pillow to and fro, shouting, “DESTINY! DESTINY! NO ESCAPING THAT FOR ME!” Then, *BOOM!*: Marius had heard a very loud bang coming from the room adjacent to Courfeyrac’s bed, and then silence. As a last thing, he admitted he’d had a hard time falling asleep again, and as a matter of fact that morning he was feeling a little sleepy.

“Ahahahahah! He’ll never change!” Enjolras burst into laughter. “I’m sorry! I should’ve warned you.”

“Ah… that’s not something occasional, then…” Marius said almost smiling, letting himself succumb to Enjolras’s laughter.

“Unfortunately, it happens every night… you’ll get used to it, too, just as Feuilly did!” Enjolras admitted. “Don’t worry, anyway. Surely the bang you heard was from Bahorel: as a rule, he’s the one who shuts him up!”

“YOU SLUUUUGS! IF YOU DON’T GET A MOVE I’M GONNA TELL FEUILLY TO CLOSE THE GATE!” Courfeyrac shouted, already on the entrance low stairway.

“My, don’t shout! We’re coming!” Enjolras said loudly. “We’ll part here, then. Marius, our first class’s on the first floor.”

“See you at lunch, guys?” Jehan asked, blushing.

“Sure!” Enjolras answered, waving his hand as he and Marius climbed the back stairs.

They quickly got to the math classroom and they took seat at the pair of desks at the back of the room, next to the window. Enjolras put his schoolbag on the desk and took out his phone to silence it. “Right! Marius!” he called him, turning towards him. Marius, who was busy fishing his notepad and pencil case out of the schoolbag he’d placed on the floor, sat up and looked at Enjolras with almost quizzical eyes. “Give me your phone number.”

Enjolras didn’t have to say it twice and, once they exchanged their numbers, he started bustling with his iPhone before the math professor entered the classroom. Once he’d settled everything, Marius’s phone chimed and when the boy checked to see who’d written to him, Enjolras saw him smile.

-Enjolras added you to the group “Les Amis de la Saint-Denis[1] ”- : that’s what was written on the new Whatsapp chat opened on Marius’s phone.

Enjolras smiled seeing that Marius looked happy: then, from the corner of his eye, he saw his phone lighting up in return and he too opened the app.

\- « 3 unread messages»

-Grantaire: “Hey whats going on?”-

-Feuilly: “Hey! Whose is that new number, Enjolras?”-

-Jehan: “Yay! You’ve added Marius! How nice, we’re all here now!”-

-Courfeyrac: “Awesome, blondieeeeeee! Hey there Marius! Im Courfeyrac!”-

-Feuilly: “Oh, we have a new member, then! Welcome, Marius. I’m Feuilly! It’s not that great introducing oneself like this: I hope to get to know you face to face later!”

-Marius: “Thanks a lot! I hope that too!”

Notifications kept coming in the app group they shared with the other boys: everybody was enthusiastic and welcomed Marius.

“I… I don’t know what to say…” Marius confessed to Enjolras, without stopping smiling.

Enjolras turned his gaze away from him, he thought for some moments and then he said, “Well… think of it as a sentence to bearing us!”

“Good morning, everybody.” The math teacher, a young lady, went into the classroom and everybody stood up. “Sit, sit, please. Let’s start with the roll call straight away, we have a lot to talk about.”

As the young professor called the students aloud one by one, Enjolras noticed that the screen of his phone had lit up again and, once he answered the roll call, he opened the chat, interested in the message he’d read in the drop-down Whatsapp preview.

\- « 5 unread messages »

-Courfeyrac: “NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

                 -“GUYS!!!!!!!”

                 -“IF WE DON’T MEET AGAIN”

                 -“REMEMBER”

                 -“THAT I LOVED YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

 

* * *

[1] Obvious reference to the name of the revolutionaries in the book, “Les Amis de l’ABC”.

* * *


	11. Beware the shark! - Jehan

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Morning's lessons are over, so it's ime to find the other guys and have lunch. Even the way, Jehan is still afraid of what's happened to Courfeyrac. Why did he write those things in their Whatsapp's group? Why didn't he write anything after those?

**_Jehan_ **

The bell rang at 11.30 and stated the end of the morning lessons: Jehan began to put notebook and pencil case away, thinking of what he could do during the two-hour break before the start of the afternoon periods. He wondered what the others would’ve done, but he didn’t feel like writing on the group chat: perhaps he would’ve gone to the library to read until lunchtime. He thought about Courfeyrac, too: all morning he’d been wondering in a state of concern what could have happened to make him write those texts. Everybody had wondered that, but Courfeyrac hadn’t written anything anymore.

Passing by the teacher’s desk, he was stopped by the literature professor. “Ah! Monsieur Prouvaire, wait!” professor Mabeuf told him, slipping his arm in his old suede bag. “Here are… the books you asked me about yesterday. The covers are a little worn out, but the inside is still in a perfect state.” Those books seemed really old: surely the minute professor had bought them many years before. Jehan was fascinated by their worn-out appearance, almost as if he had a priceless treasure before him.

“Oh, don’t worry! Old books enthral me!” Jehan answered, happy that the professor had brought him the books he’d asked about only the day before. He was almost afraid of touching them: who could know how much the professor cared for them! “Are you sure you want me to take them?” he heard himself speak. “They look really old… I wouldn’t want to ruin them…”

“Don’t think about it! I’m sure I’m leaving them in good hands!” the professor said, placing the three little tomes in his hands. “You’ve been my student since your first year: I know the love and care with which you treat… practically every living creature and every object. I’m sure you’re going to take care of my books, too. Ah, here I have a botany magazine which may prove useful for your plants”, he added, handing him a magazine full of dog-ears on its pages.

“Thank you very much, professor!” Jehan was very happy that he could take those precious treasures home: at last he could’ve read a reliable translation of the Divine Comedy. He knew some Italian language, yet he found reading the cantica of Heaven quite difficult. He wanted to put the books in his schoolbag but, on second thought, maybe it was better to hold them; therefore, he put just the botany magazine away. “I’ll give them back to you as soon as I can!”

“Don’t worry, I’m not going to rush you. Just keep them as long as you need them! Such masterpieces must be admired with care and without pressure!” professor Mabeuf said, adjusting his spectacles and taking his old beige velvet jacket off: now that all the students had gone out of the classroom, he could let himself have a little shabbier appearance, even if, admittedly, that old jacket with patches on the elbows didn’t give him a particularly elegant and neat aspect.

“Thanks again, professor Mabeuf! Have a nice day!” Jehan said, happy, heading towards the exit.

“Monsieur Prouvaire!” the professor stopped him. Jehan turned around and looked straight into the professor’s little dark eyes. “Mind you, don’t neglect your studies just to read that masterpiece!” Jehan nodded his head, smiling, and went out of the classroom, heading towards the library.

There was a great amount of students in the first floor corridor. Jehan went through them keeping his head low in order not to look at anyone in the eye: he didn’t do that out of unkindness, but only out of shyness. The previous years he’d always been with Enjolras and he hadn’t felt the need to interact with anyone else, except for his friends at the student house. However, this year he had chosen to attend the linguistic and literary course, while Enjolras had chosen political science; therefore, he’d found himself alone. He didn’t make a drama out of that, though: he knew that he’d have found his friends at lunch. He was climbing down the back stairs when he came across Bossuet.

“Bossuet! Where are you going?” asked Jehan, surprised by that meeting.

“Hey! Hi, Jehan!” he said, ruffling his hair. Then he pointed with his finger at the end of the staircase and he added, “I’m going to Joly and then we’re joining the others. Enjolras has written whether we feel like meeting up for lunch straight away.”

“Oh, really?” Jehan took the phone out of the large pocket he had on his sweatshirt and he checked it: he’d been so happy that he’d been given the three canticas of the Divine Comedy to the point that he hadn’t checked his phone. “Oh, yeah… well, I suppose there’s nothing wrong if we have lunch a little earlier!”

"You want to come with me to Joly?” Bossuet said smiling, passing him to get to the history classroom.

“Yeah, why not?”

 

Once they got there, Joly was still sitting at his desk, focused on doing something which to Jehan wasn’t clear: probably to Bossuet it was, though, because he sighed in a strange way, resigned and amused at the same time, and he approached his boyfriend from the back, arms up, careful not to be heard. It was obvious that he wanted to frighten him a little, but not all went according to his plans: when he was a few steps away from Joly, Bossuet tripped on his shoelaces and he fell directly onto him. Well… at any rate, the result was the same.

“Bossuet, darn you! I’ve had a heart attack!” Joly said, stroking the leg he’d fallen onto.

“Well, now you can feel your heartbeats perfectly, can’t you? Your heart rate must be 3’000 per minute!” said Bossuet, standing up.

“Of course, tachycardia’s surely a positive thing!” Joly said, squinting his eyes at Bossuet.

“Either you’re having a heart attack or tachycardia: if I remember correctly, you can’t have both! And by the way… if you’d really had a heart attack, shouldn’t you have fainted?” he answered, holding out his hand to lift him up. Joly frowned at him possibly even more than he already was, and Bossuet added, laughing, “Come on, get up: you’re as fit as a fiddle, my love!”

Jehan saw Bossuet’s smile and he convinced himself that it was impossible to be angry at him when he had that look on his face: clearly Joly thought the same, too, since his frown turned immediately into a smile and he let himself be helped get back to his feet. When they both fell silent, Jehan stopped thinking of how much it was beautiful to see them still so enamoured and he suddenly remembered that they’d both fallen to the ground. “You’re not hurt, are you?” he asked in concern.

Joly turned abruptly, as if he’d been taken by surprise, “Oh, hi, Jehan! Well, my leg hurts a bit and, actually, my backside too isn’t…"

“Nah, we’re great! I’ve had worse falls!” Bossuet interrupted him.

“Speak for yourself!” Joly said, turning towards his boyfriend with indignant eyes. “Tomorrow morning I’ll surely have a huge bruise…”

“Yeah! As if you’d never ever woken up with bruised legs and your backside hurting!” was Bossuet’s answer. “And it never seemed to me that it displeased you…” Saying so, Bossuet put his arm around Joly’s shoulders and gave him a knowing look. Jehan was confused by this sentence, but it seemed to him that Joly was embarrassed as Jehan saw him shove Bossuet slightly, as if he shouldn’t have said something like that.

Then he turned towards Jehan and said, “Eheh… Let’s… let’s join the others, uh?”

And so they headed to the canteen. In the great room there were already several students and Jehan couldn’t see any of their friends. Then he spotted Bahorel’s head in the queue. “Ah, there they are!” he told the two boys, and then he went towards him. As he got closer, he saw that Bahorel was next to Marius; and when he got even closer, he saw next to the latter first Enjolras, then Grantaire, but he couldn’t hear what they were talking of.

“Enjolras!” he called him softly, shyly raising his hand. Enjolras had probably heard him, though, because he quickly turned around, suspending the conversation, and as he saw the three boys, he raised his hand to greet them.

Once they got in line with the other four boys, Jehan noticed that Combeferre and Courfeyrac still weren’t there. He could imagine where Combeferre was, but what about the latter? “Hey, but...”, he began speaking, “where’s Courfeyrac?”

“Nobody knows”, Grantaire answered, handing Enjolras a tray.

“Ah, thanks”, he said to Grantaire. Then he spoke to Jehan again, “We’ve not heard from him all morning long.”

“Surely nothing’s happened to him, has it?” Everything that had happened after the end of the classes had made him forget his concern for Courfeyrac’s texts, but not seeing him with the others had made all come back to his mind.

“No, he’ll be fine, don’t worry. He just loves being dramatic. As soon as we see him we’re going to have him explain, perhaps he’s with...” Enjolras didn’t end speaking because his attention was caught by the entrance door. He kept looking there for some moments, as if he wanted to be sure of what he’d seen, then he jerked his hand up: Combeferre had entered the canteen.

“I switch my phone on and I find a hundred of your texts: you don’t ever pay attention to your classes, do you?” he said with quite a joking tone. “Where’s Courfeyrac?”

“We thought he was with you”, said Grantaire, popping out from behind Enjolras.

“No, I haven’t heard from him the whole morning.”

“How strange”, Bahorel said. “He usually breaks our balls all day long: what could’ve happened to him?”

“Oh, well! He’ll come! Had it been something serious, we’d have known!” Bossuet said to the rest of the group.

Once they’d taken the food, they sat at a great rectangular table not too far from the entrance, so that, had Courfeyrac arrived, he would’ve immediately found them.

At a certain moment Jehan saw a tall boy with dark, curly hair entering from the door: he recognized Feuilly at once and he called him, raising his arm.

“Here you are! The gang’s all here!” Feuilly said, a huge smile on his face. He then looked at the boys sitting at the table one by one and he added, “Well, no... it’s not _all_ here.”

“Haven’t you seen Courfeyrac around, by any chance?” Enjolras immediately asked him.

“No, I’m sorry!” That said, he greeted the others: except from Enjolras, he hadn’t had enough time to do that properly the day before. “Bahorel! You’ve come, today! It’s like a miracle!”

“Today?! You mean yesterday you weren’t here?!” Enjolras and Combeferre were already severely staring at Bahorel.

“What are you talking about?!” Bahorel said immediately. “Combeferre! You saw me! And you guys, too!” Enjolras kept staring at him with a cold, straight face: that look made Jehan’s blood freeze in his veins.

“Whatever, don’t believe me!” Bahorel said. He looked like he wasn’t intimidated at all by the leader’s icy eyes.

“Enjolras...” Jehan put a hand on his shoulder and he turned around. “Please... stop staring like that... it’s scaring me...” Enjolras seemed a little taken aback by those words, but he decided to satisfy his request nonetheless.

However, he frowned one last time at Bahorel and told him, “We’ll talk about this later!”

Feuilly looked at the right of Bahorel and he saw Marius. “Oh! You must be Marius!” he said, getting closer to him. Marius stood up to shake his hand and they introduced themselves properly.

“Are you on break? Will you stay here with us?” Combeferre asked him.

“Yes, but not for long. I must to be at the orphanage in forty-five minutes for my shift”, Feuilly answered, sitting next to him.

They talked for several minutes, exchanging tales about their holidays and the first days of school, giving Marius some tips to survive at school and in the student house. Jehan watched them. Even if only a month and a half had passed without them, he’d missed his friends a lot. They were all so different, and yet they couldn’t have been closer; right then, he could feel how strong their bond was. Being there, all together again, filled his heart with indescribable joy. Moreover, he had a new friend now, and this made him even happier. That day he could feel that the school year couldn’t have started better. What could’ve ever gone wrong?


	12. Beware the shark! - Marius

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> During the lunch-time finally Courfeyrac appears. Marius and the oter guys want to know what is happened to him, and...

**_Marius_ **

Marius’s day couldn’t have been better: that morning, he and Enjolras had talked a lot, both during and between their classes, and at lunch he managed to take part to the conversations with no doubts or hesitations. All those little things which had made him worry the day before, now seemed like trifles. The guys had welcomed him into the group like a good old friend coming home from a long journey and they hadn’t made him feel like he was ‘the new guy’. Marius couldn’t stop thinking about that and he kept telling himself that he’d been very lucky to meet such nice and friendly boys: it was clear to him that none of the other boys he’d met there at school was like them. Before coming, he’d thought he would have found trust-fund babies full of themselves; instead, he’d found a group of easy-going, humble, fun, unpretentious boys… boys who, after only two days, had made him feel a good feeling, as if that were the place in which he was meant to be; almost as if that were his home.

There were omelettes for lunch that day at the canteen. Each student could choose a filling and the cooks would heat everything on the spot: rich people’s canteens!... Marius was about to give a bite to the last piece of his ham-and-cheese omelette when something similar to a human hurricane crushed on their table.

“GUYS!” Courfeyrac shouted, slamming his schoolbag on the only free corner of the table, next to Bossuet. Marius leaned forward and he saw him beyond Joly and Bossuet, panting, as if he’d run.

“I’m still eating that omelette, if you don’t mind”, said Combeferre with all the calmness he could, yet letting a disapproving remark through in his tone; Courfeyrac had gone near to hit his tray and Feuilly’s one.

“Look who showed up!” exclaimed Joly, as soon as he had recovered from the sudden fright. “Where have you been?”

“Yeah!” Bossuet seemed to agree, as Joly cleaned his light blue pullover from many little sauce stains. “We haven’t heard from you all morning!”

Courfeyrac sat down on one end of the bench, next to Bossuet, he moved his schoolbag onto the ground and answered, “Well, I couldn’t get in touch with you!” He then grabbed the fork from Feuilly, who was sitting in front of him, and he took a bite of the boy’s tuna omelette.

“No, really, help yourself, I wasn’t hungry!” said the young caretaker sarcastically. Marius thought that Courfeyrac hadn’t heard the sarcastic hint in his voice, since he saw him grab the still half-full plate and eating as if he hadn’t done that for months, murmuring something to Feuilly, his mouth full. Then he saw Enjolras sitting in front of him, patiently passing Feuilly the remaining of his vegetables omelette: Marius, that same morning, had already guessed that Enjolras wasn’t one of those people who eat a lot, and his slender body proved his theory to be right.

“Hey, starving one!” Marius heard Bahorel’s voice rise from behind his head. “Are you going to tell us what’s happened to you or should we guess?”

“You made us worry…” Jehan added. “Why did you write such things?”

Courfeyrac noticed that everyone was staring at him, so he swallowed the last piece of the tuna omelette and he stood up, head bowed and a bleak look on his face. For some seconds he kept silent, eyes closed, then he stretched out his arms and, staring at an undefined point in space, he said, “Flashback tiiiiime!”

He told that, that morning, he’d arrived in class and he’d sat at the back, next to the wall, so to hide as much as he could from the teacher. Then he’d seen the notifications on Whatsapp and he’d got distracted, all excited by the fact that Marius had been added to the group. While he was typing away, he’d heard the teacher open the door and he’d managed to see him as he made his entrance, peeking above the head of the girl who was in front of him.

“Good morning, everybody.” The fearful and utterly inflexible ‘I-am-the-Law’ Javert had made his entrance in the classroom and all the students had stood up to greet him, except Courfeyrac, but it had seemed to him that the professor hadn’t noticed it. Courfeyrac went on telling that he jokingly had played Bach’s ‘ _Toccata and Fugue in D minor_ ’ on his iPhone mp3 player, accompanying professor Javert’s entrance with a dark organ sound **_– TANANAAAAA! TANANANAAANAAAAAAA! –._** Courfeyrac went on narrating his traumatizing experience, telling that he’d heard his classmates giggle and he’d seen Javert lift his gaze up from the list, staring at him and closing the register.

After that, he’d heard him say with a sigh, “Monsieur De Courfeyrac. I notice that this year, too, you have decided to put yourself in the spotlight from the very first period.” Then he had stood up speaking on, “I, too, shall therefore resume last year’s habits. Surrender that mobile phone to me immediately.”

That said, he’d started to walk towards Courfeyrac with slow, determined steps, his back perfectly upright and his hands gracefully placed behind it. The boy had had just the time to write those last four texts that his friends remembered before seeing his phone being taken away.

“Something’s telling me you’ve been very smart…” Enjolras said once Courfeyrac had finished telling everything. “Pardon me, what the heck were you thinking when you used your phone during Javert’s period?!”

“He has a point… I wouldn’t have ever done something like that either, not even if I had been drunk!” said Grantaire, grabbing the bottle of water he had on his tray.

Bahorel burst into a loud, deep laugh and, still breathless, he said, “I wish I’d been there just to witness the look on that hound’s face as he heard your soundtrack!”

Hearing this discussion, Marius wondered up to what point could this professor Javert be so terrible… It alarmed him a bit, but he didn’t show it: he just listened and tried to imagine him. For a moment, the elegant and refined figure that had formed into his mind overlapped with that of Lord Voldemort… or maybe the latter wasn’t scary enough either…

“What happened after that? Where have you been till now?” Enjolras had started again, with the same exasperated look on his face of a mother who witnesses his child coming back home full of scratches.

“I made a little inspection”, Courfeyrac told him before burping loudly. “Oops… sorry!”

“Oh oh! That was one hell of a burp!” Bossuet exclaimed, amazed. “High five, man!”

“Oooh, c’mon! It’s just… disgusting!” Joly exclaimed by contrast, holding his nose because of the tuna smell that had spread with Courfeyrac’s breath. “You could’ve at least put a hand on your mouth!”

“Really! It was one of the best burps I’ve ever heard!” Bossuet pointed out to him.

“Could be, but never is he going to beat the burping cup holder!” Bahorel chimed in: Marius understood that he was speaking of himself, and quite proudly, too!

“I totally agree. No one can beat you: the noise of your bodily sounds passes the number of decibels allowed by the law!” Grantaire teased him. Marius saw him turn on his left: Enjolras was staring at him with stern, almost terrifying eyes. Never had he seen such a look in all his life: it was even worse than the one he’d given Bahorel shortly after Feuilly’s arrival. Grantaire seemed not to be at ease under that gaze, but he kept staring at Enjolras nonetheless.

“Could we not change the subject?” Enjolras reprimanded everybody. “An inspection where? To do what?” Courfeyrac stared at him in silence, then he quickly glanced at the other boys.

“You must help me!” he said banging a hand onto the table. One could feel the boys’ concern tangibly filling the air.

“Why something’s telling me that you will get us all into trouble?” said Combeferre, who was already about to take his head into his hands out of despair.

“I have to get my phone back! It’s been unfairly taken away from me!” After this utterance from Courfeyrac, the whole group stayed silent, almost as if they were at one time appalled and exasperated.

Enjolras was the first to break the silence. “I don’t really think you can speak of unfairness.”

“Can’t you just be patient?” Marius said, not understanding why Courfeyrac was having such a haste.

“Marius is right!” Combeferre supported him. “After all, he’s going to give it back to you at the end of the week.”

“But what am I going to do without my phone for a week?” Courfeyrac said as indignant as Joly had been about the burp.

“You can do a lot of things without your phone!” Jehan told him in a low voice; Marius almost didn’t hear him, as he was drowned out by the voices spreading through the canteen. “You could find a new hobby, like drawing, reading or writing!”

Marius thought that Courfeyrac was seriously thinking about it because he saw him stare at Jehan in silence, his pensive look resting upon the redhead’s large brownish sweatshirt. “But I want my phone back now!” Famous last words: Courfeyrac snapped awake from the stare and vehemently banged his hand on the table… again.

“Will you just stop killing this poor table?” Feuilly scolded him.

“I need you!” said Courfeyrac, pointing at him. Feuilly was regretting having talked: it was as plain as day on his face. Almost immediately Courfeyrac went on, “I need you to fetch me a map of the school!”

“W-why?” Feuilly was plainly afraid of hearing the answer.

“This building is old! There must be some secret passage leading to Javert’s office!” Courfeyrac looked like he was strongly committed as he explained his theory. The other boys of the group just exchanged bewildered looks, finding no words to describe that idea.

Marius finally spoke, “You _are_ aware of the fact that this isn’t a detective film, aren’t you?”

“Courfeyrac,” Combeferre spoke, “this is a Medieval palace. Perhaps you could find a secret way out underground, but I doubt you’re going to find secret passages, especially on the first floor, where the master’s rooms were!”

“And even if there were, I don’t have maps old enough to report them!” added Feuilly. “You’d need the original ones and I don’t think they’re in the school.”

“Grantaire, you know every corner of the city!” Courfeyrac tried on stubbornly. “Don’t you know how I could sneak into Javert’s office?”

“Ah, I’m sorry, Courfeyrac: this school is the only place in which I don’t have any contact!” Grantaire answered him.

“The problem does not arise, anyway”, Enjolras said, cutting the conversation short, “because you, Courfeyrac, will not sneak into Javert’s office. Period.”

That was the leader’s ultimatum: nobody retorted. Feuilly had to hurry to go to the orphanage and the boys walked him to the entrance to wave him goodbye. They hanged around the cloister chatting a bit before the lessons started again, as Courfeyrac tried once more to convince the group to surreptitiously help him get his phone back. Enjolras and Combeferre tried as much as they could to dissuade him from doing that, but it seemed useless. Even Marius tried to make him use his brain. It was in vain: the more the guys tried to change his mind, the more Courfeyrac insisted.

They wasted time discussing and then the hour came to start the afternoon classes. Joly and Bossuet were the first to go away: Joly didn’t want to be late and he pulled his boyfriend away with him. The others escorted Bahorel to the classroom in order to be sure that he actually attended, then they climbed all together the monumental stairs to the first floor where there were the classrooms in which they would’ve had their lessons. Courfeyrac was the last one left together with Marius and Enjolras until they got to his classroom.

“I have three hours to develop a flawless plan. I’m going to get my phone back!” These were the last words that Marius and Enjolras heard from Courfeyrac before he closed the classroom door behind him. Marius looked at the door, almost shocked, then he turned towards Enjolras and he saw him lift his eyes to the ceiling; eventually they went to the history classroom, passing by the back stairs. Walking along the hall overlooking the main square, they met a tall, sturdy man; his short hair was already grey and his beard was slightly thick but very well-groomed. His posture was elegant and collected; he was wearing a refined dark suit and under the jacket he had a light blue shirt. Even though he wasn’t wearing a tie, his clothing appeared as quite dignified. Once he was close enough to them, Marius could notice that the man was in his fifties and he could see up close his bright green eyes, as much kind as they were austere.

“Ah! Good day, monsieur Enjolras!” the man said politely.

Enjolras nodded his head as a greeting and he answered back, “Good day, professor Javert.” That was Javert?! He was totally different from the man Marius had imagined… he didn’t seem so terrible as the other boys described him, not at all. 

“I’ve had the opportunity to ascertain that this year you’re going to be part of my new political science class”, the professor went on, his eyes looking intently into Enjolras’s. He had a very low voice and his way of speaking was kind, almost reassuring. “Be prepared: I ask the best from my students!” Then his eyes shifted to Marius, looking at him from top to toe for some moments as if he were curious; in front of the deputy headmaster’s elegance Marius almost felt intimidated, wearing his old blue short-sleeved shirt opened to reveal the white tee, and his slightly worn-out jeans. Professor Javert smiled at him, however, and the embarrassment faded a bit. “I don’t remember meeting you, monsieur…?”

“He’s Pontmercy”, said Enjolras, sensing Marius’s uneasiness. “He’s new here, professor.”

“Ah, of course! Marius Pontmercy! You too are part of my third-year class!” Javert held out his hand for Marius to shake and introduced himself. “I’m professor Javert, law teacher and deputy headmaster of this school: I’m going to be your professor for the next three years.”

Marius reciprocated the professor’s polite smile and he shook his hand saying, “It’s a pleasure to meet you, professor Javert.”

“Unfortunately I won’t be able to teach you this week: I’m busy filling in the files of the new students. I’ll let you go, now: never would I want you to come late to class.” That said, he gave a nod and a smile to take his leave and he let the two boys pass so that they could quickly head to class.

Professor Javert had made a great impression on Marius: he didn’t seem so terrible and strict, quite the contrary! He started to think that maybe Courfeyrac had exaggerated, that he may have been a little overdramatic in his account… or maybe not? He couldn’t explain the reason of such uncomplimentary descriptions: he’d seemed polite to him and, at first glance, very competent, too. It was useless to think about it then: he would have discovered about it soon.


	13. Beware the shark! - Enjolras (2)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's time: lessons are over, and Enjolras and Marius are keeping their stuff to go home. But when they go out from the classroom, Courfeyrac is waiting for them...

**_Enjolras_ **

The afternoon went by normally: the professors tried to get to know their new students, showed that year’s programme, handed the book list out and started to explain the new topics, like every year. When they could, Marius and Enjolras talked of completely different topics, from tips on how to deal with the teachers to anecdotes of the previous year. When the bell rang marking the end of the school day, the two boys stayed a little longer in the classroom so to let the majority of the students out and therefore to avoid the end-of-the-classes crowd. They were the last to go out, even after the teacher, and they noticed Courfeyrac standing in front of the classroom door and gazing absentmindedly at the sky out of the window.

“Courfeyrac, why are you here?” Marius said approaching him, while Enjolras stood perfectly still at the door.

Courfeyrac heard him and he quickly span around, almost as if Marius had interrupted a deep thought of his. “Ah, there you are!” he said. Then he retrieved his schoolbag from the floor and he went towards them, adding, “I’ve been waiting for you.”

“Why have you been waiting? Have you finished earlier?” Marius asked him.

“Our English teacher hasn’t been appointed yet, so they let the cage open”, was Courfeyrac’s answer.

“The cage?” was the only thing that Enjolras felt like asking, now leaning against the doorframe. “The usual melodramatic!” Perhaps he would’ve been better not to speak a word, because suddenly Courfeyrac’s focus shifted from Marius to him. The curly-haired boy passed by Marius, going near Enjolras and starting to look at him straight in the eye for some moments without uttering a word. Enjolras felt a shiver run down his spine: his friend’s wide eyes didn’t look promising. He understood what he was about to ask him, so he forestalled him, “I have no intention of helping you sneak into Javert’s office!”

“But why not?! He’s in Myriel’s office now: he’s never gonna notice it! Now’s the moment!” Courfeyrac said, grabbing the blond boy’s shoulders and shaking them.

Enjolras wriggled away from his clutch. “Because it wouldn’t be right!” he said then, distancing himself a bit from him.

“Don’t you think that he’s going to get suspicious once he doesn’t find your phone there anymore?” Marius asked tentatively, probably trying to talk some sense into him.

“He won’t even notice!” Courfeyrac answered, looking like he was getting impatient. “He probably already doesn’t remember of having confiscated it anymore!”

“Who?! Javert?!” Enjolras said, dragging back Courfeyrac’s focus onto himself. “The one who has kept throwing a truancy in my first year back in my face until last year?! That man has a memory like an elephant, Courfeyrac!”

“Yours is one in a thousand cases, Enjolras!” Courfeyrac tried to answer back: he was clearly trying to find a pretext not to admit he was right.

“Oh, please, he even remembers how many times he’s punished you for the pranks you did to him or to the other teachers!” Enjolras pointed out, hoping of convincing him once and for all.

Courfeyrac frowned, crossed his arms, dug in his heels and said, “That’s not true! He does not remember all the times I’ve pulled a prank on the teachers!”

“That’s just because the only two times you’ve tried to pull a prank on Valjean he himself covered you up from Javert!” Enjolras reminded him, pointing a menacing index in his face almost as if he were scolding him. The reproaches seemed to be working because Courfeyrac kept staring at Enjolras’s finger in silence for several moments. Enjolras lowered his hand, but Courfeyrac stared some more at the floor silently; he seemed to snap awake only when they heard a voice coming from the hall leading to the square.

“So! Have you come up with a plan?” Grantaire was walking towards the trio. Courfeyrac smiled at him; by contrast, Enjolras looked at him bewildered, feeling a mix of indignation and reproach.

“Seriously, Grantaire?” he told him, completely still, while Courfeyrac was already running to him. “After all that’s been said at lunch, you’re really with him?”

Grantaire shrugged, smiling at him, and he said, “What do you think it matters? We’ve been in trouble for worse.” Maybe he understood that he hadn’t been convincing because he lifted his gaze to the sky, sighing, and he went on, “Put your sense of justice aside, Enjolras: we’re not asking you to steal that phone. Just to take it back.”

“It’s not a matter of justice, but of fairness!” Enjolras reprimanded him. “You know perfectly well that Javert had every reason to confiscate it! Come on, Grantaire, be serious!”

Grantaire let a chuckle escape from his mouth, shaking his head with eyes closed; he then looked at Enjolras and said, “By contrast, you should let yourself go a bit more, little one.”

Once again, he and Grantaire didn’t agree; Enjolras would have wanted to carry on with the debate (never would he have given up on his opinion), but that wasn’t the right time. Every time he and Grantaire disagreed about something, whatever the topic, they ended up fighting: Enjolras was aware that they both were very stubborn. It didn’t seem appropriate to him to start an argument right there and then, with Marius watching them, as it was just the second day he’d been spending with them and he didn’t want to risk putting him in an awkward situation. Inside himself, though, he felt a kind of anger grow and the temptation of responding was almost oppressive. His face was almost surely like an open book because Marius got near him and put a hand on his shoulder, almost as if he understood what he was thinking and as if he tried to console him. Enjolras looked at him for some moments without changing his face, then he sighed resignedly, he gave a nod to Marius and they both approached Grantaire and Courfeyrac, who were already plotting away.

“Have you convinced yourself, blond leader?” Courfeyrac said, still delighted to have an ally.

“No”, Enjolras answered curtly. “I am not convinced at all, really… But I want to follow you to make sure you won’t get into trouble.” Enjolras would have wanted to forget about them and, once things had gone bad, he would’ve really liked to say ‘I told you so!’, but his protective instinct towards them prevailed: if he couldn’t prevent them from doing something foolish, he would’ve at least tried to limit the damages. Grantaire gazed at Enjolras with a strange smile: he seemed almost pleased with that resignation, and yet, there was something else in his eyes, something Enjolras couldn’t work out. The blond boy noticed that and felt like telling him to just stop smiling like that, but once more he forced himself to silence, simply looking at him with stern eyes.

 

Once they had arrived outside Javert’s office, the four boys found Bossuet and Joly waiting for them, sitting on the floor and leaning against the wall in front of the deputy headmaster’s room, and Bahorel too, busy hitting his heel on the old wooden door. Bossuet was the first to see them come and he raised his hand to greet them.

“What are you doing here?!” Enjolras asked straight away. He couldn’t believe that they were out there: he didn’t _want_ to believe it! His reaction probably frightened Bossuet since he immediately lowered his arm, as if he felt guilty.

“It’s locked!” Bahorel said, completely ignoring his question. “I hope you’ve come up with something else, Courfeyrac.”

“Shit, I haven’t!” Courfeyrac said, snapping his fingers like they’d just ruined his flawless plan.

“Hold on…” Marius said, looking at him in disbelief. “Your plan was to just open the door and get into the office? I thought you’d planned something really brilliant.”

“Well, when I heard Javert would’ve gone to Myriel’s I thought that would have been enough!” Courfeyrac defended himself. “I’ll have to think of something else.”

While pondering on what to do, Combeferre, Jehan and Feuilly climbed up the back stairs. “I told you we would’ve found them here”, Combeferre told the other two. “I actually was expecting to see you too here, Enjolras. For a moment, though, I thought you’d just bailed out.”

“Yeah, I’d have wanted to avoid all of this, but it was useless. I guess we’re here for the same reason, am I right?” Enjolras told him as Combeferre got near him until he was at his left.

“Watching over him so that he doesn’t get into serious trouble? Yes, I suppose so.”

“Guys, we’re gonna get busted!” Joly said, starting to get worried. From the way Bahorel looked up to the ceiling, huffing, it could be told that it wasn’t the first time he said that. “Stop trying to get into Javert’s office, Courfeyrac! Let’s just go home and forget about this before we all get into trouble!”

“Chill out, baby!” Bossuet tried to calm him, running a hand through his hair. “The school’s practically empty and one of the caretakers is our ally: what could ever go wrong?”

“I have never said I would cover you!” Feuilly said immediately, implying that, had it depended on him, he wouldn’t even have come up there to check the situation.

“EUREKA!” Courfeyrac hollered. As soon as they heard him cry out, everybody tried to shut him up with a sonorous ‘SHHHHHHHHHHHHT!’, worried that somebody could have heard him.

“Are you out of your mind?!” Grantaire scolded him, almost whispering. “That’s the first thing to avoid if you don’t want to get busted!”

“But… but why don’t you just leave it as it is?” Jehan said: his voice volume was so low that he didn’t need whispering. “Nothing’s gonna happen to you if you wait a week… isn’t it?”

“No! It’s a matter of principle!” Courfeyrac said, hitting with a punch his other hand. “Come with me!” They turned the corner and Courfeyrac pointed at a narrow little window above them. “I believe this leads to the office loo!”

“Isn’t it too narrow for you?” Enjolras said, understanding that Courfeyrac intended to get in through it.

Courfeyrac turned towards him with a weird grin on his face. “Yeah… For me, it is …” he said, looking at him from top to toe.

Enjolras glanced perplexedly at him, then at himself to see whether something was wrong with him, then once more at the window and it all clicked into place. “Oh no! Forget it!” Enjolras said immediately, stepping back.

“Only you can get through there! Come on, please! Look at me, I’m begging you!” Courfeyrac said, actually getting down on his knees and clasping his hands together.

“Stop that! I told you that I’d come, not that I’d help you!” Enjolras said, trying to make Courfeyrac stand up.

“Well, he’s not the only one who could get through there…” Grantaire said as if he wanted to defend him. Enjolras was confused by this. Only minutes before he’d been backing Courfeyrac up, then why now he seemed to be almost protecting him? As he stared at him, Enjolras saw Grantaire glance at the rest of the group.

“You’re not sending _him_ there!” Bossuet said, moving Joly back with one arm. “All we need is for him to have a panic attack! You’d have to say goodbye to him and to your phone!”

“I… I don’t want to go into Javert’s office… sorry, Courfeyrac, but I just don’t want to…” Jehan said, hiding himself behind Feuilly.

After these reactions, Courfeyrac turned again to Enjolras and looked at him with a set of beaten-up puppy eyes. “Pleasepleasepleaseplease!” he told him in a single breath, kneeling down again in front of him.

“I said no: stop doing that!” Enjolras answered. Courfeyrac insisted, going closer to him on his knees, and Enjolras stepped back; doing so, he bumped straight into Bahorel’s chest. The sudden bump made Enjolras look all of his friends in the eyes: he saw encouraging looks and disapproving looks. He then went back to looking into Courfeyrac’s pleading eyes and his kindness prevailed. He shut his eyelids, he lifted his head towards the ceiling, sighing very deeply, and he gave up. “Alright!”

“Really?!” Courfeyrac jumped up immediately, as happy as a child on Christmas day.

“But”, Enjolras tried to hold his enthusiasm down, “if there isn’t a way to go out without waiting for Javert to open that door, this thing’s off, is that clear?! I don’t want to get into trouble for such a foolishness!”

“Agreed!” Courfeyrac said grabbing his hand to let him shake it, as if they had a serious deal.

“Enjolras, no… just leave it at that!” Combeferre told him immediately, putting a hand on his shoulder.

Enjolras turned towards him and said, “It’s not taken for granted that I’m gonna have to do that. In any case, I count on you to be on the lookout…”

“You can use the bog to climb out of the window: it’s just down here!” Courfeyrac said. Having turned towards Combeferre, Enjolras hadn’t noticed that, behind him, Courfeyrac had climbed onto Bahorel’s shoulders and was peering into the bathroom.

Bahorel placed Courfeyrac on the ground, then he held out his hand for Enjolras saying, “It’s your turn, blondie.”

Why had he even said he would’ve done it? Why?! He was already regretting that… but it was too late to go back now. He handed his schoolbag to Marius, he got help from Bahorel to climb onto his shoulders and tried to get inside and to land on the toilet which, luckily, was closed. He managed to get there standing (he never understood thanks to what strange contortionist talent, but that wasn’t the time to think about it). He opened the restroom door gingerly, almost as if he feared that someone were on the other side, and he went into the office. Enjolras had already been there before and he saw that nothing had changed since then: the old, dark-wooden desk was still at the centre of the room, as usual maniacally tidy; the shelves, stuffed with books and made of the same wood of the desk, were still against the wall in front of him, and the great swivel chair was there with its back turned towards the window, neatly placed under the desk. The room was somewhat dark because professor Javert had taken care of lowering the rolling shutters before going away; perhaps he wasn’t planning on returning.

Enjolras entered the room furtively and he headed straight to the desk: it had more drawers than he’d imagined. He started to open them in order from the top left one; luckily, the drawers were perfectly tidy, too, so Enjolras wasn’t taking too much time examining their contents. All of a sudden he felt his iPhone buzz from the back pocket of his trousers. He pulled it out and he found a new text on Whatsapp:

-Combeferre:

“Javert’s coming! Hide!”

He had the time to open just one last drawer and, for who knows what grace received, he found Courfeyrac’s iPhone. He took it and he immediately ran to the restroom, while he was already hearing professor Javert turning the door key. He closed the door to the restroom and he heard the teacher enter the office: he’d made it in the nick of time, but he wasn’t feeling safe yet. Trying to make as little noise as he could, he went to the toilet, he stepped on it, quickly climbing to reach the window, pulling himself up with his arms and climbing with his feet on the white-tiled wall; he got through the window, making his head pop out first – the toilet was too far apart from the opening for him to be able to go out by his feet. Luckily for him, on the other side Bahorel and Feuilly had been standing under the window, ready to take him by the arms and pull him down safely.

“Thanks, guys”, Enjolras said, catching his breath. He kept leaning on Feuilly as he breathed deeply to calm himself more than out of the effort.

“Are you alright? Is everything ok?” Feuilly asked him, worried. Enjolras looked up towards him, then he noticed that everybody seemed quite preoccupied with what had just happened.

“Yeah, don’t worry”, Enjolras said, straightening himself up. He drew one last breath, he looked at Courfeyrac and handed him his phone. “Bear in mind that you owe me a huge favour!”


	14. Beware the shark! - Bossuet

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Finally Saturday! Bossuet wakes up in his room and sees his boyfriend sleeping. He's thinking to spend all his day with him in totally relax... but he didn't take into account Courfeyrac's plans!

**_Bossuet_ **

The sun seeping in from the shutter slits woke Bossuet up gently: during the weekend Joly didn’t set the alarm clock and the two of them always got up taking their good time. Once he was awake enough to be in full possess of his faculties, he realized he was lying on the floor, wrapped up in the sheets in some strange way. It happened with a certain frequency that Bossuet would fall out of the bed; he was used to sleep on the edge, so, if at night he happened to turn over, *BAM*, he would find himself on the floor. More often than not the fall was so hard that he would wake up, then going back to bed or waking Joly up since he wasn’t sleepy anymore; at other times, the blankets would soften his fall and he’d sleep on. That night either it had to have happened like that, or he was so worn out from those first five days of school that, even if he’d hurt himself, he wouldn’t have noticed.

Bossuet tried to untangle himself from the sheets and, after succeeding, he stood up, rolled them into a ball and placed them on the bed without caring of smoothing them up. He was just about to go to the bathroom and tidy himself up a bit before breakfast when he turned to Joly: the boy was still sleeping like a baby, in his usual position, one he’d found in who knows what book suggesting a series of methods to favour a good sleep. He was there in his bed which he’d relocated himself so to be northwards, lying on his back, hands on his stomach and legs crossed: Bossuet didn’t understand those fixations of his, but he was damn cute, lying there like that! He approached quietly, kneeling beside his bed; he slightly brushed his hair and kissed his cheek. He kept petting the brown thick hair, watching Joly slowly open up his eyes.

“Good morning, love of mine.” Bossuet was gazing at him with the sweetest of the looks, as if he were looking at the most precious thing he possessed.

“Good morning”, Joly answered in a still tired voice, reciprocating that look as far as his still sleepy eyes allowed him. “What’s the time?”

“I haven’t the foggiest!” Bossuet answered cheerfully.

“Then why did you wake me up?” Joly asked, turning on his side and still facing Bossuet, letting his boyfriend go on cuddling him tenderly.

Bossuet looked into those green little eyes and his gaze grew even softer. After some moments of silence he answered, “Actually I didn’t mean to wake you up. I just wanted to give you a kiss, but since you’re awake…”

“No… not now…” Joly interrupted him, as if he’d understood what his boyfriend was referring to. “It’s too early… I don’t feel like it.”

“Ahahah! You misunderstood me! I didn’t mean to say that, don’t worry!” Bossuet said, knowing exactly what Joly had thought of. It hadn’t even crossed his mind, actually… that is, until then. “But maybe tonight…”

“Uhm…” Joly didn’t look like he was convinced by the idea. “I don’t know… better to talk about this later.”

Bossuet tried to persuade him, “Come on! It’s been forever since last time… it was before the holidays. We haven’t done it since we came back.”

“I don’t want to think about it now”, Joly told him peacefully, pulling himself closer to him. “Tell me what you meant earlier, instead.”

Bossuet was a little upset that Joly hadn’t answered him. “You’re grumpy early in the morning, mmh?” he said jokingly, ruffling the lock of hair on his forehead. “I just wanted to ask you if you want to come have breakfast with me, so that I won’t risk going alone.”

Bossuet saw Joly glance at the alarm clock he had on his nightstand and, instinctively, he turned around too: it was nine a.m.. Joly couldn’t complain of having been woken up since he’d had his good eight hours of sleep.

“Alright”, he said, sitting up and leaning his back onto the brass headboard of the bed. He stretched, leaning forward a bit, and said, “Just give me a couple of minutes.” Bossuet watched him rub his eyes, then he stood up and sat beside him on the bed; he took him by his shoulders and pushed him gently against the headboard, he moved his hand on his cheek and he kissed him.

It was a rather long kiss, after which the two of them looked at each other for some time. It was Joly who broke the silence; looking at his boyfriend with a smile, he said, “Are you sure I wasn’t right? Is it possible that you changed the subject after my refusal?”

“Can’t I even kiss you now?” Bossuet told him almost laughing, while stroking the boy’s cheek with his thumb. “I don’t always have ulterior motives, you know?” That said, he leaned closer and kissed him again. Then he stood up and he went to the bathroom to tidy himself up a bit.

 

When the couple arrived in the main room, Bossuet saw that at the table there was only Enjolras, busy reading a great tome: why on Earth did he have to read such a book so early in the morning? And furthermore, on a Saturday!

“Enjolras, what are you doing?” Joly asked, probably as surprised as Bossuet was, seeing him study so early.

Enjolras woke up from his reading and he looked up from the volume: “Ah… good morning, guys.”

Joly went behind him and put one hand on the round table and the other on the seatback of Enjolras’s chair. “What are you reading so early?”

“I’m doing an in-depth research on international law”, the blond boy answered before yawning unwillingly: he tried to limit it as he could, as if yawning were rude.

“Why?” Joly asked in surprise. Bossuet understood the reason of his puzzlement: he’d told him something about international law the year before, while telling him how one of his school days had been. He too felt like wondering why Enjolras was doing a research on a fourth-year topic when he’d just started his third year.

“It’s my punishment for having helped Courfeyrac get his phone back”, Enjolras said, cracking his neck. “When Javert found it all out, I had to confess to having helped him. We didn’t mention your names, don’t worry: we took all the responsibility.”

Joly and Bossuet shared a glance, as if they felt guilty. “And you’re doing it at this hour?” Bossuet said, getting closer to the two boys.

“Actually, I’ve been working on this all night”, Enjolras explained, taking the pen back in his hand and writing something on the notebook beside him: it almost looked like he was listening to them and working at the same time.

“You could’ve asked me and Bahorel”, Bossuet then told him. “We did it last year: it wouldn’t have been a problem helping you.”

Enjolras shrugged, still keeping his eyes on the book, then he said, “I didn’t want to bother you with such a trifle.”

“Yeah, but…” Bossuet said, feeling even more guilty for everything that had happened, “we were there, too, this past Wednesday. You didn’t mention us, and helping you would’ve been the least we could’ve done.”

“Don’t you worry, Bossuet”, Enjolras looked up and answered him with a reassuring smile. “I wasn’t that sleepy tonight. Besides, I’ve finished. The only thing I need is some coffee”, he concluded, dropping the pen and leaning on the seatback to stretch a little. His eyes looked very tired; maybe he would’ve needed some sleep, more than a coffee. He rested his elbows on the table and sank his head in his hands, closing his eyes, as if he were feeling unwell.

“Everything alright?” Joly immediately asked him, concerned.

“Yeah, yeah… just a bit of a dizziness, that’s all.”

“Go get some sleep, come on”, Joly told him, bowing down to look in his eyes. “You have to make up for the sleep you’ve lost, otherwise you may end up feeling sick…”

“He’s right”, Bossuet chimed in before Enjolras could say anything at all: he visibly would have wanted to answer back. “If you don’t stop a bit, you’re going to end up collapsing one day.”

Enjolras looked at them smiling and said, “Maybe you’re right!” Then he grabbed textbook and notebook, he slowly stood up and headed to his room; before going out of the great common room he turned towards them, thanked them and went away, briefly meeting Grantaire and Bahorel in the hall.

“What happened?” was the first thing Bahorel asked as he saw Joly and Bossuet, pointing with his thumb at Enjolras behind himself.

Grantaire kept looking at Enjolras as he went away, and his gaze seemed concerned. Once the boy was no longer in sight from the room, he turned and said, “When I asked him, he answered, ‘Nothing, don’t worry’, but I know it isn’t true.”

“He was up all night studying”, Joly answered them, going closer to Bossuet.

“In other words, nothing that some sleep can’t fix”, Bossuet added, seizing Joly’s hand. “Will you have breakfast with us?”

“Uhm.” Bahorel thought about that for a moment, then his stomach made itself be heard. “Well… after the jog we’ve had, I’d say a second breakfast makes sense.” He put a hand on his stomach and he turned to Grantaire. “What do you say, R[1]?” The other boy seemed distracted: he was still looking at the hall and he didn’t notice that Bahorel was talking to him. Realizing that he hadn’t been heard, Bahorel patted him on his abdomen and told him, “R! Are you awake?”

“Ouch!” Grantaire exclaimed immediately, moving his hand to the spot where Bahorel had hit him. “I get that you wanted me to listen, but did you really need to hit me so hard?”

“Are you having breakfast or what?” the other said, not bothering to answer.

“Just a coffee, perhaps”, Grantaire said, shifting his attention back to the hall. Right then Combeferre arrived: he noticed Grantaire’s gaze and turned around in confusion, as if he wanted to understand what he was staring at. Bossuet felt like smiling seeing this, and Combeferre’s bewildered look made the whole thing even funnier.

“Problems?” was the first thing Combeferre asked entering the room. Bossuet noticed that he was smiling: perhaps he was already aware of what was racing through Grantaire’s mind.

“N-no, not at all!” the boy answered right away, almost embarrassed. “Sh-shall we go have breakfast?”

It seemed that Combeferre wanted to drop the subject, so the boys headed to the kitchen. Joly stopped Bossuet, grabbing his arm, and told him, “Did anything happen to Grantaire, according to you?”

Bossuet turned to glance at Grantaire, then he turned to face Joly again and he told him, “No… in any case, nothing new!”

 

The morning passed smoothly, growing into afternoon, and Enjolras was still in bed, not showing up even for lunch. The other boys were all in the common room: Bossuet was sitting on the floor watching a movie on his laptop with Joly, one earphone to him and one to his boyfriend; Bahorel, Grantaire and Marius were watching a football match on TV, whereas Jehan, Combeferre and Courfeyrac were sitting at the table. Jehan was reading, Combeferre was rewriting his notes and Courfeyrac should’ve done the research he’d been assigned by Javert as a punishment, yet it looked like he was engaged in other thoughts.

Bossuet thought that, with his free ear, he’d heard Courfeyrac say something but he wasn’t sure, so he didn’t turn around in order not to miss the film scene: he was about to learn at last how Alfred Borden could do the trick of the transported man!

“Bossuet! Joly! Are you listening to me?” Courfeyrac raised his voice to be heard.

“Wait, wait! We’re about to see how he can transport a man!” Joly said, adjusting his earphone.

“What’s that? The movie with Hugh Jackman about the two illusionists[2]? The one in which one of them has a twin brother?” Bahorel said from the couch, just turning his head.

Joly looked at him in shock for a moment, then he said, “Thank you for spoiling the end to us!”

“Oh-oh! I was right, then!” Bossuet said enthusiastically as he saw on the screen that what Bahorel had revealed to them was true. Then he snaked an arm around Joly’s neck, turning to him, he pulled him closer and added, whispering in his ear, “I’m gonna cash in the winnings of the bet tonight, my darling!”

Joly managed to pull back a little, enough to look at him in the face as he told him, “Like you wouldn’t have done that all the same!”

“Guys, will you listen to me, please?” Courfeyrac said, trying to bring the focus back onto him. He’d stood up, placing both hands on the table and leaning forward. Bossuet decided to pause the film; he and Joly pulled the earphones away from their ears, so to make him understand that they were listening. “Thanks”, Courfeyrac went on. He then started pacing the common room, hands behind his back. “So – every one of you surely remembers of having promissed me something before the end of last year…”

The boys shared glances in silence: what promise was Courfeyrac talking about? Bossuet thought he’d missed something, since he couldn’t remember promising anything at all. He looked at Combeferre, since he always remembered everything, but he didn’t seem to understand what Courfeyrac was referring to either: he was looking at him from above his glasses with a confused and even a little perplexed stare.

“Yeah, come on, guys!” Courfeyrac said, seeing that his friends couldn’t remember. “You promised me that we’d have gone to the pool all together before the end of the summer!” Oh, right! Now Bossuet did remember: last June, Courfeyrac had been such a pain in the neck about going to the pool that Enjolras, exasperated, had told him that before the end of the season they would’ve gone there together; they had had too many tests and final exams at that time, so they had postponed it all.

“It’s true! Now I do remember, too!” Jehan piped up, looking up from an old book Bossuet had never seen before. “I remember Enjolras took me to buy a new pair of shorts to go there! Remember, Combeferre? You too were with us.”

“Yes, I remember, Jehan”, Combeferre told him sweetly, brushing a hand on his back. He then turned to Courfeyrac, “And when would you go?”

“What’s the date today?” Courfeyrac asked, trying to understand if the pool was still opened.

Bossuet looked at the laptop screen and said, “The 6th. Usually the pool closes down by mid-September.”

“Well”, Bahorel started, stretching on the couch and turning up the TV volume; he’d lowered it to listen to Courfeyrac. “I guess it will close next Sunday, and in two Monday’s time it’s gonna be the 15th. We can arrange for next Saturday, if you care that much!”

Courfeyrac went straight to him, he tore the remote off his hands and switched the TV off. “Courfeyrac, you’re cruel!” Marius said, as he stopped holding in his arms one of the couch cushions sitting on the floor in front of the TV. “I wanted to see if they would score or not!”

“Let’s go tomorrow!” Courfeyrac told Bahorel, falling to his knees close to the boy’s face. “I wouldn’t want the pool to close this weekend!” 

“Yeeeeeeah…” Bahorel told him, staring at him petrified, almost as if he were unsettled. “Just start getting away from my face, before I land a punch in yours!” Courfeyrac moved away: Bahorel’s threats scared even him.

“Come on, guys! Planning a day at the pool’s a cakewalk!” Courfeyrac went on to convince them, standing up and looking at them one by one. “It’s not that I’m asking you to go, like, now!”

“I honestly haven’t taken my swimming briefs with me…” Grantaire said while sipping the beer directly from the bottle. “I didn’t think I would’ve needed them now.” 

“We can go buy them!” Courfeyrac said, turning abruptly towards him.

“Shouldn’t you be doing Javert’s research?” Combeferre said, glancing at the law book opened on the table. “Do I have to remind you that he wants you to hand it in on Monday? If you have to go buy the swimwear now and you want to go to the pool tomorrow, when are you planning on doing it?”

Courfeyrac ran at once to him, he threw himself onto the table and begged him, his hands joined together, “I’m gonna finish it when we come back, I promise! But please, let’s go!” The other boys shared pensive looks, as if they were deciding what to do just by looking at each other.

Jehan was the first to speak up, “Well… it would be nice to spend a day in a different way… considering that the school year’s begun just this week, we don’t have a lot to do.”

Bossuet got persuaded. “Come on, let’s grant him that! It’ll be fun!”

Bossuet noticed that everyone seemed convinced to accept the idea, except Combeferre, who looked at the others one by one: everybody seemed keen on accepting the suggestion. “I want to talk with Enjolras about it, first”, he said finally, standing up. “Especially because I don’t believe you’re really doing that research, if you waste two days like this. He’s been categorical: you’re serving this punishment, since you shortened your first one by taking your iPhone back! And I agree with him.”

“Go wake him up! Go wake him up!” Courfeyrac, overcome by enthusiasm, was tugging at his arm to and fro. “Tell him I promise to do that research tonight and I won’t go to sleep until I finish it!”

“I am not waking him up!” Combeferre answered curtly, withdrawing his arm.

“I’ll go, then!” Courfeyrac was already running to Enjolras’s room, but Combeferre stopped him, grabbing him by his t-shirt.

“Let him rest quietly!” he said. “You’ll wait the amount of time that’s needed!”

“See if he’s woken up, at least!” Courfeyrac pleaded him finally. Exasperated, Combeferre agreed and went to his bedroom. “Yay!” cried out the black curly-haired boy. “I’ll call Feuilly!”

“What makes you think that Enjolras will agree?” Joly told him as he was already looking for Feuilly’ number on his phone.

“As soon as he remembers he’s promised me, he’s gonna say yes: he’s made that way!” Courfeyrac said, grinning from ear to ear. “Hello, Feuilly?” he said, going out of the room to hear better.

They had to wait almost half an hour before Enjolras and Combeferre came back and approved Courfeyrac’s idea. As soon as Enjolras uttered the word ‘Alright’, Courfeyrac jumped the highest he could and hugged him, then he immediately fled to his bedroom to get ready to go out. Enjolras gave a sigh – he was probably still tired after he’d woken up – and after Combeferre put a hand on his shoulder as if to encourage him, he gave the others a nod with the head, hinting them to get ready to go out.

Everyone went to their rooms. In the common room there were now only Bossuet, who was placing his laptop back into its bag, and Marius, still sitting on the floor. Bossuet approached him, he put a hand on his shoulder to catch his attention and told him, “Aren’t you coming?”

Marius looked confused. “M-me?”

“Of course!” Bossuet said immediately, smiling at him. “You’re invited too, you know!”

Marius seemed really happy to hear those words from him. Bossuet helped him to his feet and the two headed together to their rooms in order to get changed.

* * *

[1] Nickname given to him by the other boys, it’s pronounced like “air” with a rolled ‘r’.

Reference to the novel: during the description of Grantaire, Hugo writes, “[…] This sceptic's name was Grantaire, and he was in the habit of signing himself with this rebus: R.” ‘Grantaire’, in French, has the same pronunciation of ‘big R’; therefore, ‘capital R’.

[2] A little homage: in the 2012 film, Hugh Jackman played the role of Jean Valjean.


	15. Beware the shark! - Grantaire

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sunday: it's time to go to swimming pool together! Grantaire wishes to spend his day with Enjolras, even he didn't consider that this is the first time he will see him wearing swimsuit...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This paragraph is one of authoresses' favourite. :3

**_Grantaire_ **

“Are you ready everybody? I can’t keep the minibus parked here!” Feuilly’s voice went along the narrow stairwell up to the first floor where the boys were finishing getting ready. Grantaire was in his room, the door opened, and he was checking that he had everything in his bag: spare clothes – check, towel – check, sun cream – check too, swim briefs – he was wearing them…

“Grantaire?” The boy immediately recognized the voice calling him and he turned around: Enjolras was at the doorstep, tapping on the door lightly, as if to knock. He was wearing short, bright jeans and a red thin t-shirt falling softly on his hips: fuck, those clothes really suited him… “Are you ready? We have to go.”

Seeing Enjolras out of the blue had made him forget all that he was doing. He stared at him for a moment, then Enjolras called him again and he got back down to Earth… more or less. “Uh? Ah, yes, yes!” he said, turning again towards the bag. “I just have to remember where I put my sunglasses… I can’t find them.” There was a moment of silence in which Grantaire kept rifling in the bag, looking for his glasses. After some seconds he noticed that Enjolras had moved to be next to him, close enough to make his heart beat wildly, even more than before. He then felt someone pulling something away from his hair.

“They were on your head…” the blond boy said, holding the glasses Grantaire had been looking for.

“Oh…” Grantaire said, surprised by the fact that he hadn’t noticed. “I figure my head’s a bit in the air today!” Giggling, he retrieved the glasses from Enjolras’s hand and he slipped them into the bag, aware of the fact that the boy’s light blue eyes were still watching him.

“Come, quick: Feuilly needs to move the bus.” Saying this, Enjolras went out of the room to join the others downstairs. Grantaire went back to breathing with a long sigh, sitting down on the bed for a moment: it was only 9.30 a.m. and he’d already made a fool of himself in front of Enjolras! Damn himself and his awkwardness! He had no time to think about that, though: he needed to go downstairs at once, at least not to make him angry.

Once he got to the ground floor, he saw Marius talking to Éponine at the reception; he’d seen them talking a lot during the past week. He couldn’t hear what they were saying, though: only when he approached to call Marius did he hear him tell her, “Are you sure you don’t want to come? Feuilly says that there’s room enough for us all on the bus, if you want…”

“No, Marius… I can’t…” she answered in a sorry voice. “I must stay here and help my parents… If I take their place during the weekend, they give me some rest the other days.”

“Alright… next time, then.”

“Marius!” Enjolras was calling him from outside. “Are you ready?”

“Coming!” he shouted in answer. Then he turned to Éponine and he waved at her with a smile. “Later!”

Grantaire went towards the minibus waving at Éponine, and he heard Enjolras asking, “Is Grantaire on his way?”

“I’m here, I’m here!” Enjolras and Feuilly were off the vehicle – they had been waiting for the two of them. Once he got on the minibus, Grantaire saw that all the other boys were already there: Bossuet and Joly had taken the front seats, since Joly suffered from motion sickness – at least that’s what he said; Jehan was sitting next to Combeferre on the seats behind them; and just behind, Marius had taken place next to Courfeyrac while Bahorel was sitting near them on a single seat, tuning his guitar, an old baseball bat on his head. Grantaire took the other single seat before Bahorel’s. He then saw Feuilly take the driver’s seat and start the engine while Enjolras glanced quickly at the others to ensure everyone was there; after that, he nodded at Feuilly, sitting down next to him.

 

The first part of the travel ran smoothly: the boys could be heard chatting along and from time to time the sound of Bahorel plucking at the strings of his guitar could be heard. He’d forgotten to take the tuner, but he didn’t need it: Grantaire had noticed a long time before that Bahorel’s musical ear could make even the pros green with envy. While he was chatting with Bahorel, he noticed Jehan showing the clouds to Combeferre, who was patiently watching, trying to recognize the shapes seen by the petit boy. Then Grantaire looked in front of him, at Enjolras. He saw him talk to Feuilly, sharing glances and smiles – sometimes they didn’t even say anything – but Grantaire couldn’t hear what they were talking about. Joly was the only one who didn’t look like he was relaxed: he probably wasn’t feeling very well. Bossuet was trying to distract him, making him rest his head on his shoulder and trying to make him think of something else. From time to time, Enjolras too would stand up and go to them to make sure he was fine, then going back to talk to Feuilly: holy cow, just what were they even saying?!

“Let’s sing something!” Courfeyrac shouted, jumping to his feet.

“Sit down”, Combeferre said listlessly without even turning around. No way: Courfeyrac immediately started crying out some song, but he was so off-key that no one could get what it was. Poor Marius stared at him, speechless. Grantaire thought that the boy would have liked some ear plugs so that he couldn’t hear him, and actually he would’ve liked them too! He didn’t label himself as a music expert, but as a child he’d taken some lessons and now hearing off-key notes annoyed him a bit.

“CAN I AT LEAST FINISH TUNING MY GUITAR?!” Bahorel yelled at Courfeyrac in order to overcome his voice volume – a cinch for him and his vocal power.

“You can, but get a move!” Courfeyrac said, moving restlessly in the narrow hall between the seats. “We’ve been on the road for ten minutes already! How long does it take?!”

Slightly bent over his guitar to hear the sound of the strings, Bahorel said, “It takes the time it takes! It’s not that easy finding the perfect note with no tuner! If you shut up once in your life, I’d surely find it more quickly!” Bahorel was no perfectionist; with music, though, it was a different matter. He couldn’t stand out-of-tune sounds, whether a single note or a chord, not even if the composer himself had wanted it to be that way. Grantaire by then was well aware of the fact that he seemed to suffer physically whenever he heard a sound he didn’t like: he would’ve kept tuning that string until he’d heard the right note.

“Got it!” he said, hearing his E at last. “Any requests?” He probably noticed that Grantaire was distracted because he turned towards him, slapping his arm and saying, “Why don’t you sing something, R?”

“Uh? M-me?” Grantaire said, turning all of a sudden towards him. “I don’t know...”

“You can sing, Grantaire? Really?” Bossuet said, popping out from behind Joly. “I didn’t know that!”

“Well... let’s just say I manage.”

“Sing sing sing!” Courfeyrac shouted at him enthusiastically, going near to him.

“Sit down, you!” Combeferre said, plainly starting to lose his patience. Grantaire realized that everybody had turned towards him: it appeared that Bahorel alone knew he could sing. Had he really never sung with the others around? He really couldn’t remember.

“Ok. Uhm...” Grantaire said, thinking of what song he could’ve sung. “Do you remember the chords of Death Cab For Cutie’s ‘ _I Will Follow You into the Dark_ ’[1]?”

Bahorel looked at him perplexedly, almost as if he weren’t convinced of his choice. “Of course, but I’d expected something... happier!” he said, getting himself ready to play. “But if you like it…” That said, he started to play.

Grantaire felt the other boys’ looks on himself: this made him a little uncomfortable and at first he wasn’t sure he wanted to start singing, but when he heard Bahorel’s cue note he started all the same. _“Loove of mine - some daaay you will dieee. But I'll be close behind. I'll follow youu into the daaark.”_

Hearing himself sing for the first time in a while, Grantaire noticed he had a very sweet voice, delicate and clean as he changed the notes, and that made him a little more confident: he hadn’t sung properly in weeks, yet to him it looked like that he was managing pretty well. Grantaire thought that perhaps the other boys weren’t expecting it, because he saw them looking at him as if they were surprised that he really could sing. In a moment in which he was singing without focusing too much, he turned around and he met the only eyes he cared about. Enjolras, too, had turned around to face him and listen to him. Grantaire would’ve liked to keep looking at him, but his shyness had the best of him and it forced him to look away. “ _If heaven and hell deciiiide. That they both aaare satisfiiiiiiied. Illuminate the noo's on their vaaacancy siiiiiiiigns_ ” From time to time he turned again towards the blond boy, as if he wanted to make sure that he was still watching him: he liked to feel his pensive light-blue eyes on himself. At a certain moment Enjolras put his arms on the seat and he rested his head there, closing his eyelids, as if he wanted to listen better. Grantaire couldn’t look away from him anymore, and it seemed to him that everything around them disappeared. “ _If there's no one beside youuuuu. When your soul embaaaaaaaaarks. Then I'll follow youuu into the dark. Then I'll follow youuuu intooo the daaaark.”_

“Bravo! Fuck!” The enthusiasm with which Courfeyrac had shouted at the end of the song and the following cheers broke the magic that had formed in Grantaire’s mind: he looked around, as if he didn’t understand what had just happened. When he realized he’d ended the song, he smiled and thanked his friends.

“When did you learn to sing like this?” Marius asked him, and he seemed pleasantly impressed by Grantaire’s talent.

“When I was a child, my mother enrolled my sister and me in a music school”, Grantaire explained to him. “There I learnt to sing and to play the cello. I’ve quitted the instrument, but I practice singing every now and then.”

“Who’d have ever told...” Feuilly let slip out of his mouth, smiling in surprise: Grantaire could see his face from the rear-view mirror.

Jehan seemed to light up with something very close to wonder his eyes. “You’re great!”

“He’s right”, Enjolras said. Hearing him say that, Grantaire turned abruptly towards him: he wasn’t expecting that. He looked at him for a moment and then he smiled to him.

“Enjolras, could you tell me which way to go, please?” This time it was Feuilly who broke Grantaire’s magic moment, catching Enjolras’s attention: damn...

“Now _I_ ’ll sing!” Courfeyrac yelled, taking all the eyes back onto himself.

“Choose a song we can all sing!” Bahorel said, handing him the songbook. “My ears are not going to bear your off-key notes again: better to try covering them with other voices.”

 

Once arrived, Feuilly made them get off so that they could enter while he looked for a car park big enough; Enjolras headed to the ticket office with Combeferre and Courfeyrac to pay the entrance fee. When the four of them came back, the boys went to the locker room: clothes in the bags, caps and towels at hand and then – away and outside. The outdoor was very wide and Grantaire noticed five swimming pools: two for children, a third one with slides and low water mark, an Olympionic one and lastly the main one, a huge infinity pool with an inclined floor. Looking around, in addition Grantaire saw a great bar, a little beach volley court and a playgrund area next to a wide sandy zone. Enjolras suggested swimming in the Olympionic pool as long as it wasn’t taken: all the families were scattered among the other pools to let the children play, therefore that one was the less crowded pool. Then Combeferre pointed at some pool chairs on the poolside: they had been reserved just for them when they had payed the ticket. Grantaire noticed that Marius and Feuilly were almost bewildered by all this: they had had amazed and taken aback looks on their faces since they had entered.

“What’s with you two?” Grantaire asked them.

“Nothing, it’s just... this pool is enormous!” Feuilly said, without ceasing to look around.

“Besides”, Marius started to add, “have you really reserved those pool chairs for us?! When I went to the pool, I used to sit on the floor, onto the towels!”

“Too much luxury for my taste: I’m not used to that!” Feuilly said looking at Combeferre, who was passing by him just then.

“I thought that going about with us for two years had grown you accustomed”, Combeferre replied, taking the pool chair next to Enjolras’s. “Ah, come to think of it... We’ve talked about that, and we’ve paid everything for you.”

“What?” Feuilly said. “No, guys! No way!”

“You didn’t want us to split the fuel cost”, Enjolras said, rifling for something in his bag. “You really didn’t think that we would’ve let you pay the fee?”

Feuilly got closer and he sat down next to him, saying, “If this was your idea, I suppose I have no hope to make you change your mind, haven’t I?”

“Exactly!” Enjolras said, without looking away from the inside of the back pocket.

Grantaire walked on with Marius and they settled on the two chairs after Courfeyrac’s, where the boy had been calling them. Bahorel was sitting on the reclinable chair next to Grantaire’s, busy putting his brown hair under the swim cap.

Once he was finished, he noticed Jehan staring at the sandy zone. “What are you looking at?” he asked him. “You’re not really thinking of going there?!”

“Why not?” Jehan replied at once. “I want to build a sandcastle!”

“Are you serious?!” Bahorel said. Grantaire, busy covering with sun cream the wind star he had tattooed on his left arm, careful to cover properly the curls stretching towards the crook of his elbow and his wrist, realized that Bahorel felt the urge to laugh: what teenager would have really started to play with sand under everyone’s eyes?

“Yeah, what’s the matter?” Jehan’s big, bright blue eyes landed on Bahorel, leaving him speechless. The sturdy boy turned towards Grantaire, stunned, as if to ask if he’d really just heard that.

It was when Grantaire shrugged to him that Bahorel turned to Jehan and told him, “Cover your head, at least, ‘cause if you get a sunstroke Enjolras’s gonna be pissed!” He grabbed his own hat which he’d left on the chair and he put it on Jehan, who touched his head smiling and ran happily to the sandy zone.

“Thanks Bahorel!” he’d shouted as he ran. Bahorel watched him go away, then he sighed, he nodded to Grantaire to follow him and dived straight into the pool.

Grantaire sat a little longer as he took his shirt off. In front of him, Joly and Bossuet had taken an outdoor umbrella, they had lain on the same pool chair and, hugged together, they had fallen asleep: perhaps they hadn’t slept that much the night before. In any case, he wouldn’t have disturbed them. He stood up, taking his trousers off, and he sat down on the poolside: the sun was already high and it was somewhat hot, but the water was still cool from the night; therefore, he didn’t dive in straight away.

“Where’s Jehan?” he heard Enjolras say behind him. Grantaire turned around, seeing Feuilly lying down on the pool chair and Combeferre solving some puzzles on a magazine, sitting beside him. Sliding his gaze further on the left, his eyes met Enjolras: he was standing, sun cream in hand, and he had just taken his shirt off. Grantaire had been staying there looking at Enjolras, gaping and with no reaction, when Courfeyrac managed to drag Marius with him into the pool, causing a big splash of water to fall on him.

“He’s gone to the sand pit”, Grantaire prompted him, pointing with his finger at the place where Jehan was; that splash had taken him back to reality.

Enjolras looked in that direction, he sighed deeply and, with a loud voice but trying not to shout, he said, “Jehan, come here a sec!” While Jehan was going back to them, Grantaire, who was already wet because of Courfeyrac, sank into the water, placing his elbows on the poolside to support himself and to be able to watch the scene.

“Here you are!” Enjolras went on. “Put on some cream, at least, or you’re going to get sunburnt!” He made Jehan sit down on the ground and, kneeling down himself, he started spreading the sun cream on his back.

Courfeyrac re-emerged with Marius, next to Enjolras, and told him, “Look at you! You’re being such a mother hen!”

“His skin’s so fair that he can’t stay in the sun with no cream!” Enjolras said without turning around.

Then Courfeyrac leaned forward towards him, starting to pull his swim shorts and shouting in a childlike voice, “MOOOM, CAN I BAAATHE?”

Probably embarrassed from what was going on, Enjolras turned around abruptly and told him aloud, almost angrily, “Y-you’re already in the water, Courfeyrac! Quit pulling my shorts!”

“Boy, they _are_ short, though!” Courfeyrac added then, still pulling the red shorts.

“Exactly, so cut it out!” Enjolras seemed to have lost his patience. Grantaire went on watching: for a moment he thought he wouldn’t have disliked the idea that, tugging and tugging, Enjolras’s shorts would have slid lower… just a tad, to… no, what was his mind telling him?! He plunged in completely, as if the water could take that thought out of his head, and when he got back to the surface he saw Courfeyrac holding his own hand, leaning on the poolside.

“Dad! Mom hit my hand!” he shouted, leaning forward once more.

Perhaps Combeferre felt himself being called, because he looked up from his reading glasses and said, “Are you really talking to me?”

“Of course!” Courfeyrac confirmed. “Tell Mom something!”

Combeferre looked at him, bewildered, then he adjusted the magazine on his legs and went back to his crosswords saying, “Something, dear.” Grantaire noticed that Marius looked confused from the spontaneity of that repartee, while Jehan was almost amused by it. He also saw a lost look on Enjolras’s face: Combeferre had left him speechless.

“Ugh, what a bore!” Courfeyrac protested. “Uncle Feuilly! Help me!”

“Uncle?!” Feuilly looked up from the book he’d taken to read and he added, “How did you come up with a thing like that?!”

Courfeyrac shrugged, he leaned on Marius’s shoulder with his elbow and explained, “You three are the most responsible in the group: sometimes you seem like some kind of apprehensive parents.” Nobody knew how to answer to that; while the three guys exchanged dumbfounded looks, Courfeyrac quickly yelled some vague words, something sounding like ‘SNEAK ATTACK’, and pushed poor Marius down, who could’ve expected anything but being pulled underwater so brutally.

Grantaire decided to do a couple of laps to erase what had happened from his head: he needed to relax a bit, to cool down, and a good swim what just perfect for that. He kept looking ahead of him, absorbed in his thoughts, without paying attention to anything or anyone. ‘I shouldn’t have come… what the hell was I thinking?! This, Grantaire, is called being a masochist: you’re such a fucking idiot! Now you’ll have to try all day long not to look at him, fuck! But how? He is so… so beautiful! And his body’s so well-proportioned, just perfect… Aaah, woe is me…’ His mind was full of thoughts, but he strived to get rid of them. ‘Don’t think about it, don’t think about it!’ he repeated to himself over and over. As soon as he judged his mind free of thoughts, he re-emerged and went to sit down on the pool ladder.

He took off the swim cap to relax a bit: that damn rubber thingy was pulling his hair! Looking up, he realized that what he had done had been useless: Enjolras was sitting on the poolside, straight before his eyes, spreading a veil of sun cream on his arms. The thin layer of that ointment made his fair skin glow in the sun, giving the boy an almost ethereal appearance: it was wonderful to see his body, his golden hair and his deep, light-coloured eyes shine in the sun!

“What’s the matter with you today, R?” Bahorel went near Grantaire, lifting himself on his arms and sitting down beside him, taking the swim cap and goggles off. Grantaire had heard every word, yet he didn’t answer; he didn’t even avert his gaze. Then Bahorel turned to face the direction he had been looking at and asked him, “What’re you looking at?”

“Uh?!” At that question, Grantaire blushed in embarrassment and he felt obliged to answer, at least to try and avoid getting caught. “Oh, no, nothing! I was just… I was just deep in my thoughts!”

Bahorel seemed not to buy it: he looked on and, when he finally saw Enjolras on the poolside, he exclaimed, “Ah! Well, I never! I was right, then…” He turned towards Grantaire with a look on his face as if he wanted to embarrass him, and he concluded, “You like him!” 

Grantaire felt like a deer in the headlights, but he still tried to deny the obvious. “No, what are you talking about?... It’s-it’s not like…” Bahorel’s look definitively cornered him, so he sighed, his face as red as a cherry, and he confessed, “Alright… yeah: I… I like him!”

“Oh-oooooh! See how our R blushes!” Bahorel said, placing an arm around his neck. “You know,” he went on, “Never would I have thought that you were halfway between the straight and the gay side of the river!”

Grantaire stared at him for a moment in utter awkwardness, then he said, “Please don’t tell anyone anything!”

“I must confess I am a little tempted!” Bahorel said, perhaps joking, but Grantaire couldn’t understand. “Especially as regards the blondie! I’d say that making him aware of this would be fair…”

“Please… don’t…” he just said, his voice feeble.

“Well, tell him yourself then, no?”

“Are you out of your mind?! NO!” Grantaire was so embarrassed that he didn’t even realize of having raised his voice. The look on the other boy’s face turned from amused to pensive.

“I wouldn’t have thought you were so shy, you know?” he said, leaning slightly in to look at his face better.

Grantaire raised a hand to his own face and he scratched his cheek lightly, then he said, “In… in general I’m not, it’s true… but it’s different with him… I don’t know why…” He paused briefly, looking up again towards Enjolras, then he sighed, putting his elbows on his knees and going on, “…it’s always been different with him, though…”

“Fuck…” said Bahorel, almost in contemplation. “You must like him a lot!” Grantaire didn’t answer: the long sigh he drew seemed to him more than enough as an answer.

“Alright!” Bahorel spoke again after a long silence. “Because of our friendship I won’t tell anyone anything. Let me just ask a question, then I won’t be talking of this until you want to discuss the thing.” Grantaire turned around in confusion; only after that did Bahorel conclude, “How long has this thing been going on?”

Grantaire rested his eyes on Bahorel for some moment, then he turned towards the other side of the pool and said, “Do you remember the day we all met?”

“Of course: it’s been almost two years ago already.”

“There”, was Grantaire’s only answer.

It looked like Bahorel wanted to say something and that he were at a loss for words. When he found what to say, the only thing he managed to utter was just, “Wow!”

“…‘Wow’?” Grantaire asked, surprised by the fact that it had taken him such a long time to say just that.

“Yeah… I don’t know what else to say, I mean… it’s such a long time!”

“Tell me about it…” That said, Grantaire’s gaze went back to Enjolras. Gone was his perturbation and all was good with him until he noticed Enjolras spreading the sun cream on his chest: there was something incredibly seducing in his gestures, in the way the light made the ointment shine on that body, so slender, so handsome, well-proportioned, so… perfect! Looking at him, Grantaire started feeling a series of strange sensations: his heartbeats started going faster, he was getting out of breath, he was blushing so much that he felt like his face was on fire and he even felt dizzy… they were both psychical and physical sensations.

“R?” Bahorel called him, making him snap back from the trance state he was in.

“Wha’?” Grantaire turned all of a sudden, more embarrassed and perturbed than he was before. He noticed that Bahorel was looking down almost laughing.

He pointed to where he was looking at, raising his brown eyes to Grantaire and he said, “How about telling your friend there to sit?”

 

* * *

[1] A little homage. George Balgden, who played Grantaire in the film adaptation of the musical, among his covers on YouTube once played ‘ _I Will Follow You into the Dark_ ’ changing the second verse so that it sounded like it was Grantaire singing it to Enjolras.


	16. Beware the shark! - Marius (2)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The day at the swimming pool goes on.

_ **Marius** _

They’d just finished having lunch and Marius was already feeling wrecked: during that morning he’d been thrown underwater ten times more or less, taken to the wave pool, convinced to play beach volley and dragged more than once to the slides. He just wished he could sleep a bit but he knew Courfeyrac wouldn’t have allowed it to him.

“You alright?” Feuilly appeared behind him and sat down on the chair next to his.

“Yeah… I’m just a little tired”, Marius said, resting his head on both hands.

Feuilly leaned back, propping himself up on his arms and asked him, “Courfeyrac made you do anything, uh?”

“I don’t know where he finds all that vitality…” Marius turned to look at Courfeyrac running from side to side, trying to convince Combeferre to do something not better defined.

“I’ve always wondered, too. He’s been my roommate for two years, but I never got to learn his secret!” Feuilly admitted, turning towards Courfeyrac in his turn.

The freckled boy turned to face him in surprise and asked him, “You really were his roommate?”

Feuilly looked at him smiling and nodded. “It was my first working year; I needed an affordable place where to live. You know, being economically independent, I didn’t want to stay at the orphanage: I’d have made them spend money for nothing!”

“He didn’t tell me!”

“Ahahah! No wonder!” Feuilly said, amused. “Courfeyrac’s focus is the same as a goldfish’s one! He is a good and nice boy, though. I can’t think of anyone not liking him!”

Marius turned around again towards Courfeyrac and behind him he saw Bahorel. “Well… it seems that Bahorel doesn’t get along very well with him…”

“Bahorel’s like that!” Feuilly said smiling. “It’s not that they don’t get along, it’s only that he usually keeps to himself… while Courfeyrac’s always enthusiastic about everything, lively, sometimes a little intrusive… it’s no wonder that someone like Bahorel may lose his temper.”

“You all know each other very well, right?”

“It’s been two years now”, Feuilly explained. “Ours was a strange encounter.”

“Was it?” Feuilly’s statement made him curious. “How did you meet?” The curly-haired boy was about to start telling but he was interrupted.

“GUUUUYS!” Courfeyrac shouted. When the two of them turned to face him, they saw that he was dragging Enjolras by the arm. “WANNA COME PLAY BEACH VOLLEY???”

“Quit yelling! Try to get a grip on yourself!” Enjolras reprimanded him, trying to free his wrist from his friend’s clutch.

“Sorry!” Courfeyrac said lightly without loosening his grip. Then he turned once more towards Marius and Feuilly and, raising both his own arms – and by consequence Enjolras’s arm too, since he was still gripping at it tight –, he hollered, “SO?!”

Marius thought that he’d heard Enjolras say, “Famous last words, uh? At least let go of my arm!”

“I’m in!” Feuilly told Courfeyrac raising his voice and standing up. Before going to him, he turned to Marius and said, “Stay here if you’re tired: I’ll come up with something.”

“Thanks, Feuilly.” That said, Marius lay himself on the pool chair; he retrieved his phone, he placed the plugs in his ears and, putting some music on, he closed his eyes.

He could still hear the others mutter, but his eyelids felt heavy and he couldn’t open them to watch what was going on. The mp3 player on his iPhone was playing Bryan Adam’s ‘ _Everything I Do_ ’ and the gentleness of that song soon drifted him sweetly into a deep sleep.

“Marius?” he heard a soft, light voice call him. Once he opened his eyes, he found Jehan in front of him, looking at him with curious eyes. Marius was a bit lost: he hadn’t even realized that he’d fallen asleep and he couldn’t tell how much time had passed. His slightly sunburnt knees made him understand that he probably had slept quite some time, therefore he looked at the clock on his phone and he saw that an hour and a half had passed, more or less. “You alright?” Jehan asked him.

“Yes… I think I fell asleep…” Marius answered stretching out. “Tell me, Jehan. What’s up?”

“I need a hand finishing my castle”, Jehan said blushing. “Could you please help me?” Marius realized that what he’d been told by Enjolras some days before was true: it was impossible to say no to Jehan. He got up and headed to the sandy zone with the tiny boy. He saw the boys still playing, four against four; after all that time they were probably about to end the match. Once they got to the place, Marius saw Jehan’s castle. That wasn’t a sandcastle: it was a true sculpture!

“Did you really build it yourself?” Marius said, taken aback by the meticulousness with which the castle had been built. He went closer and he bent on his side to have a better look at it: kneeling beside it, he saw that it reached his chin and it looked like a medieval fortress with its defense walls, four towers of different heights and a main gate with arches underneath. Jehan had even traced the lines for the windows and the bricks: it was a masterpiece!

“Yes!” Jehan said proudly. “It takes a lot of patience to build a sandcastle.” That said, Jehan lowered his gaze a bit and, shaking his trunks a little, he said, “I’m gonna need a shower later ‘cause my trunks are full of sand.” Marius made no effort to believe it: that neon camouflage yellow-and-brown trunks were at least two sizes larger than they should have been, so it was predictable that they would’ve been full of sand.

“What do you need?” Marius said, drifting his gaze from Jehan to the sculpture.

Jehan got closer to the castle and pointed at a fifth tower which was starting to rise behind the others. “I’d need you to help me with the last tower”, he said. “It has to be taller than the others and you’d have to sustain the basement: I’m afraid it could fall…”

Marius wondered if he would’ve been able not to ruin that sculpture. He went around the sandcastle, reaching the point in which the new tower would have been erected. He paid attention to stay away a little, in order not to risk hitting it by mistake. “Just tell me what to do.”

Jehan happily ran to fill a bottle with water, he came back to Marius and together they started to build the last tower. Marius noticed that the boy took care almost obsessively of it: he worked layer by layer, as if he were building it with real bricks. Before they completed it, the other boys had time to finish the match. The tower lacked just the roof tip when Bahorel arrived to call them.

“And this would be a sandcastle?!” he said in surprise once he’d arrived. “I expected it to be a lot less complex when you said you wanted to build one!”

“Do you like it?” Jehan said, looking quite proud of his work.

“I’d say it’s remarkable!” Bahorel admitted, squatting down between him and Jehan; from where he was, Marius could see his tattoo neatly – a long stlylised dragon in enormous Maori style, slightly fragmented and outlined in black, stretching from his left shoulder to the nape of his neck. He’d noticed it as soon as Bahorel had taken his shirt off, but he still hadn’t had the chance to look at it from a close distance. Then Bahorel put a hand on Jehan’s head and pushed downward, lowering the baseball bat visor. “Good job!”

Jehan pulled the visor up, he smiled to thank him and ran away, saying, “I want to show it to Enjolras!”

Jehan had said that he would’ve called Enjolras, but he came back with all the other boys. Everyone was impressed by his sand work: how could it be that nobody knew of that talent? Jehan dragged Enjolras close to the castle and he showed him every detail of his work, while Joly told Bossuet that it was better if he stayed away, fearing that he could trip over it. Marius noticed Combeferre plotting something with Bahorel while looking a little torn, as if he wanted to stop him from doing something. In the end Bahorel spoke anyway, pushing Combeferre aside. “Jehan, you know that it can’t stay here forever, don’t you?”

“Yes...” Jehan said, looking almost sad. “But I’m sorry to have to undo it already...”

“Why don’t you have your picture taken beside it?” Joly suggested, approaching him. “You won’t have the tangible one but you’ll still have a visible memory of it.”

“Right! Feuilly, could you take a photo of me next to it, please?” Jehan asked enthusiastically.

“Sure”, the boy said, cellphone already in hand. The others moved away, leaving Jehan alone with his sand work.

“Come, everybody! Let’s take a picture all together!” the minute boy proposed, gesturing to the others to join him.

“A photo all together!” Courfeyrac said, happy. “It’s been forever since we last took one!”

“I don’t think I’ll do that...” Joly started to say in embarrassment. He couldn’t finish speaking as Bossuet scooped him up and carried him to the castle. Enjolras too would have liked better not to appear in the photo, saying that he didn’t like being photographed. The others didn’t accept his refusal, however, so Courfeyrac and Grantaire stood up, each one taking him by the wrists and dragging him at the centre of the group.

“What about you, Feuilly?” Jehan said, popping out from behind the castle.

“I’ll take the picture, if you want”, Marius offered Feuilly: he felt a little out of place being in the group instead of Feuilly.

“Are you kidding? No, you too must be there!” Feuilly said before looking around. Then he saw a passing-by girl, he stopped her and asked her whether she could take the picture, explaining to her what to do.

Marius was really happy that the boys had wanted him there with them. That was the proof that the boys had fully integrated him into their group; it hadn’t been just an impression. They made that poor girl take several photos, one more bizarre than the other. Eventually Enjolras thought that the photos were enough, going to retrieve Feuilly’s phone from her hands and showing a certain awkwardness. Marius watched them talk, even though the blond boy seemed really uncomfortable as he answered her. Then she asked him something and he answered with a shy nod of the head, appartently saying ‘No, sorry’ without losing the polite smile he had on his face. She seemed a little disappointed, but she didn’t make him feel bad about that and she said goodbye, catching up with the girls waiting behind her. Once she was gone, Enjolras turned around, he put his hands on his waist and drew a long breath like he’d been relieved of some burden.

Marius went to him and, watching the girls leave, he asked him, “Is everything fine?”

Enjolras looked up towards him and Marius had a feeling his friend was still a little flustered. “Yeah, yeah”, he finally answered. “It’s just that I’m not really at ease with girls.”

“ENJOLRAS, MARIUS!” Courfeyrac called them from their group’s pool chairs. “WANNA DIVE IN?”

Then they went there with him and, when they arrived at the chair on which Bossuet was, Marius realized his phone was ringing.

Marius ran to his pool chair, taking the phone out from his rucksack pocket, and he answered, “Hello?”

“Marius! Where were you, son?” an old man’s voice said from the other end of the phone line.

“Grandfather!” It was the first time that monsieur Gillenormand and Marius got in touch since the boy had started going to school; he didn’t expect him to make a call.

“I’ve been trying to call you all day.”

“I’m sorry, Grandfather. I’ve been a little busy today”, Marius said, looking up towards the other boys: by doing so, he saw Courfeyrac watching him and mouthing at him ‘everything ok?’. Marius nodded affirmatively and made clear to Enjolras and to him that he would’ve walked away for a little while.

“Have you already got homework to do?” monsieur Gillenormand went on.

“No, I haven’t”, Marius said, going to a great tree just outside of the tiled area of the pool. From there he could still see and hear the boys.

“Is everything alright, son?”

“Sure, everything’s fine, thanks.” The feel of that conversation was plainly a little awkward, as Marius and his grandfather weren’t still used to talk to each other.

“CANNONBALL!!!” Courfeyrac yelled flinging himself into the water and barely missing Bahorel while landing.

“Where are you, son, though? What’s all this noise?”

Marius let out a laugh as he watched Bahorel railing against Courfeyrac. “I’m at the swimming pool with some other boys. If you hear some noise, it’s them.”

“Have you already made some friends?!” Perhaps his grandfather had uttered those words out of surprise, yet Marius could feel some happiness in the tone with which he spoke them.

“Marius, come!” Bossuet had called him from the poolside. Marius gestured that he would’ve come in a short while, then he saw Combeferre explaining to him that he was on the phone and, therefore, not to disturb him.

“Yeah… I’d definitely say so!” Marius said smiling.

“Wonderful, my boy!” said monsieur Gillenormand, glad. “I’m happy for you, son.”

“You were right, Grandfather… it was tough at the beginning, but now everything’s alright…” As he talked, Marius saw Courfeyrac getting out of the pool and retrieving a large air mattress.

Then the prominent-eared boy took a run-up and launched himself straight on the mattress and into the pool: he seemed to sink a little, but the mattress was large enough to keep him afloat. “MARIUS, GET A MOVE!” he shouted once he was on the water.

“Will you just let him be for five minutes?!” Enjolras defended him, still lying on the pool chair.

“I’ve been very lucky…” Marius added, watching the scene.

“You sound happy, my boy.”

“I am, believe me”, Marius said in all honesty. Then there was a brief pause and the boy added, “I’m… I’m sorry for having made a fuss about changing school…”

“It doesn’t matter: I can imagine how hard it’s been for you”, his grandfather said. “What’s important is that now you are at ease.”

“Thanks, Grandfather.”

“Tell me, though – what are these boys like?”

Marius pondered for some moments. “How could I describe them?” He looked up and saw Joly arguing with Bossuet.

“Come on, get into the water!” Bossuet was saying, taking his boyfriend by the wrist.

“No, please… You know my opinion about it…” Joly answered trying to pull back.

“Throw him in, Bossuet!” Grantaire spurred him loudly. Courfeyrac and Bahorel supported him, and actually Feuilly and Jehan also wanted Joly to join them. Combeferre, on the other hand, seemed to dissent from this initiative, along with Enjolras.

Eventually Bossuet got tired of trying to talk Joly into it: he firmly pulled Joly towards him, making the boy land against his chest, then he lifted him placing his arms just above his stomach and he made for the pool, shouting, “ONE… TWO…” Before he could say ‘three’, Bossuet tripped over his own feet and the two boys fell together into the water with a loud *SPLASH*. Joly quickly re-emerged and he immediately grabbed onto the side of the pool; after a while, Bossuet re-emerged too and swam to go near him.

They probably had made very much noise as the lifeguard appeared at the other side of the pool, yelling, “BOYS! YOU MUST PUT YOUR SWIM CAP ON WHEN YOU DIVE INTO THE POOL!” Bossuet turned around at once and shouted back that they were sorry.

Marius felt like laughing, then he added, “Let’s just say they’re totally nuts!”

Looking at them again, he saw Joly shaking like a leaf, scared to death, clinging to the pool side. Bossuet immediately placed an arm over his shoulder and looked on, alarmed, at which point Enjolras and Combeferre too stood up and approached him, kneeling down beside them.

“But really, they’re good guys… they really are!” Marius concluded, watching as the other members of group as well were getting close together around them.

“I’m glad of that.” There was a moment of silence – Marius was trying to focus to understand what was going on. Monsieur Gillenormand probably felt that something was distracting Marius, therefore he added, “I’ll let you go to them, now, Marius. I hope to hear from you soon. Enjoy the afternoon!”

“Thanks, Grandfather… I’ll call you soon. Good afternoon to you all at home, too.” That said, Marius said goodbye once more and ended the call, going next to Enjolras to understand what was happening.

“What’s the matter with you, babe?” Bossuet asked. He looked positively worried – quite a lot, actually.

“P-please… get me out of here… I beg you…” Joly said, still shaking; he was looking directly into the void in front of him, his eyes petrified with terror.

Combeferre, astounded, looked at him for a moment; then, after having met Bossuet’s alarmed gaze, he said to Joly, “Look, everything’s perfectly hygienic here. It’s all clean and contro-”

“No… that’s… not the point…” the boy interrupted him, seemingly panicking. The others stayed silent, not getting what was going on. At that point Joly went on, without averting his gaze from a point in front of him, “It’s… it’s just that –” Marius noticed that he was paralyzed, either with fear or with shame – he couldn’t tell.

“Wait…” Combeferre broke the silence, “Don’t tell me you can’t swim.”

Joly didn’t reply: by his silence one could tell that, had he answered, he would have said yes. Enjolras looked like he was sorry for him, while glaring at the other boys in such a way that he made clear to be mad for what they’d done. With Bossuet only he couldn’t get angry, looking at his frightened, mortified eyes. He then looked at Joly very sweetly and he gave him his hands to help him out. Bossuet pushed on his arms to get out too, he grabbed Joly by his other arm and, together with Enjolras, he pulled him out of the water. Combeferre handed a towel to Bossuet who wrapped his boyfriend into it, then making him sit down to let him calm himself.

The bald boy kneeled in front of Joly, putting a hand on his shoulder and moving away a lock of wet hair with the other. “Why haven’t you ever told me?” he asked him sweetly.

At first Joly didn’t answer – he was still too much frightened to do that. “There’s… there’s never been any need…”

“There was need now”, Bossuet reprimanded him.

“I’d have been ashamed if you guys came to know it…”

“You silly thing!” That said, Bossuet sat down beside him, he made him turn around and hugged him.

“There’s no need for you to be ashamed when you’re among us”, Enjolras said, kneeling down next to him and putting a hand on his shoulder to comfort him. “We’re your friends: we’re never going to make fun of you for this, or for anything else.”

“We all have something we never learned to do. You don’t need to be ashamed!” Combeferre backed him up. The others too went to him to apologize for what had happened. Joly managed to smile to thank them, yet Marius noticed that he was still a little shaken.

Bossuet held him close to his chest, placing a kiss on his nape and, resting his head on Joly’s, he told him, “Come on, relax! It’s all over! You’re safe, now.”

Marius crossed Enjolras’s gaze, as if he were looking for his confirmation about what he was planning to do. Marius understood what the leader was thinking of and he nodded; it was incredible just how much they’d got to know each other during one week.

“Do you want us to leave you alone for a while?” Enjolras said. “Perhaps you can make him relax a little.”

“Yes, thank you, Enjolras”, Bossuet said with a nod of his head.

Then the other boys left them, but Grantaire stayed a little longer: he put a hand on Joly’s shoulder and told him, “I’m sorry for what’s happened… Feeling a little better?” 

Joly looked at him giving a hint of a smile and replied, “Yeah… thanks, Grantaire… don’t worry…”

“He’ll be fine in a minute, R”, Bossuet concluded for him. “Just chill. It’s my fault, after all, not yours.”

 

It took some time for Joly to recover from the shock and for the mood to go back to what it had been before. Marius, still a little tired after that morning, had just finished reading a chapter from ‘ _The Pillars of the Earth_ ’[1] when Courfeyrac called him to invite him to join him. The boy was laid on his air mattress in the middle of the pool: it was the first time that he wasn’t moving to and fro that day. The freckled boy put the book in the rucksack, he put the swim cap on and swam towards him.

“What’s up?” Marius asked him once he was close enough.

“Nothing, I just wanted to chat a bit!” Courfeyrac said. “I don’t like being here alone and idle, but the others all have something to do!” Marius looked around: Joly was sitting with his feet in the water next to Enjolras and they were talking of what had happened; Grantaire was having a chat with Bossuet, the both of them leaning on the poolside with the elbows, not too far from the other two boys; lastly, Marius knew that Feuilly, Combeferre and Jehan had decided to go to the Jacuzzi to relax a bit.

“Where’s Bahorel?” Marius asked, not seeing him anywhere. Courfeyrac tried to look around to spot him, but he didn’t find him; he shrugged and started talking of something else.

At a certain moment Marius, out of the corner of his eye, saw something pop out from behind the mattress; looking better at the thing, he noticed that it was someone’s head emerging just for a half out of the water, eyes hidden behind a pair of black goggles. He moved beside the mattress and, he realized that that ‘someone’ was Bahorel. When Courfeyrac turned around, Bahorel dived completely, leaving just a hand out of the water like a shark fin.

“We’re facing a hand shark, Marius”, Courfeyrac said dramatically. “Watch your back!”

After having swum in circles a few times around them, Bahorel put his head out of the water just where he’d shown himself before, he looked at Courfeyrac with a wicked grin and dived once more, so deeply that the boy couldn’t see him anymore from the mattress. Marius saw Bahorel swimming under him before being dragged underwater and taken to the pool side. When he was able to see again, Marius noticed that Courfeyrac was leaning out of the mattress, looking for Bahorel: perhaps he’d been frightened by the fact that he’d taken Marius away quite brutally, as he looked definitely more scared than before.

“Wh-… where’d he go?” Marius heard Courfeyrac say. Before Marius or the other boys could warn him, Bahorel appeared from behind him and, *SPLASH!*, he capsized the mattress making the boy fall into the water. The mood had definitely come back to what it had been before the incident.

 

* * *

[1] A little homage to the actor Eddie Redmayne, who played Marius in the film adaptation and whose facial and body features have been the source of inspiration for Marius in this fanfiction. Eddie Redmayne played the role of Jack in the short series of ‘The Pillars of the Earth’, produced by Ridley and Tony Scott and broadcast in 2010, inspired by the homonymous novel by Ken Follett.


	17. Beware the shark! - Courfeyrac

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Are you ready to know how was the group's first meet? Courfeyrac is here to tell you!

**_Courfeyrac_ **

The day went by smoothly, among jokes and laughter. Courfeyrac couldn’t get out of his mind that before leaving he had to do at least two things: making Enjolras get into the water, even by force, and taking revenge of the prank Bahorel had pulled on him. The chance for his vengeance happened towards the end of the afternoon, when the boys were thinking of going back home. Grantaire was still in the pool and Bahorel had been standing on the poolside, freely talking to him. Courfeyrac took a good run-up, going straight towards Bahorel.

“SURPRISE ATTACK!” he yelled shoving him with his shoulder; this made Bahorel lose his balance and fall into the water. Bahorel quickly remerged and he looked daggers at Courfeyrac.

“THE SWIM CAP, BOYS!” the lifeguard shouted again. Bahorel didn’t turn around; he pulled himself out of the water and headed straight to Courfeyrac, who in the meantime was laughing his head off.

“That made you laugh, uh, Courfeyrac?” he told him, the look in his eyes unchanged; at a certain moment they both heard Enjolras’s voice joining Courfeyrac’s laughter. “Ah! I see you find it funny too!”

“Let’s just say I think you deserved it!” Enjolras said, managing to stop laughing.

Courfeyrac went to Enjolras, giving him a high five. Then Bahorel’s expression changed into a grin. “Very well, justice paladin!” Bahorel went to the slender boy, he lifted him up and ran to the pool saying, “We’re gonna see if you feel like laughing again, now!”

“Wait! NO!” Before Enjolras could add anything more, Bahorel had already thrown him into the pool. That was how Courfeyrac saw his two aims fulfilled.

Enjolras leaned onto the poolside, his long, completely wet hair flowing on his shoulder. “Ok… I see the reason why you did it, and I’m gonna give you that!” was his only remark.

“BOYS, I DON’T WANNA REPEAT MYSELF ANYMORE!” the lifeguard shouted again, exasperated. “YOU MUST WEAR YOUR SWIM CAP TO STAY IN THE POOL!”

“I’M SORRY! IT WON’T HAPPEN AGAIN!” Enjolras answered him, slightly embarrassed.

Courfeyrac went back to the pool chair and found Marius packing up his things in the rucksack.

“Courfeyrac”, the boy spoke when he noticed he was there, “can I ask you something?”

“Sure. Anything you want.”

Marius sat down on the pool chair, putting his rucksack next to himself, then he went on, “How did you all meet?” Courfeyrac was surprised; that was a question which usually children ask their parents, and he wasn’t expecting that. “I mean…” Marius spoke on, “you’re all so different, you even have different ages. How did you meet?”

Courfeyrac thought back to that day for a moment and he started to giggle. “That’s something I like to tell!” he said as he sat down beside him. “This is how it all started that day, two years ago…”

_“You’re gonna get caught, François! We’re gonna get in trouble because of you!” Combeferre and Courfeyrac were outside of the school chemistry laboratory as the curly-haired boy peered inside the classroom to make sure nobody was there._

_“Don’t rain on my parade, Michel!” Courfeyrac immediately hushed him. “The professor needs a lesson! I’ll just leave the stink bomb under her chair cushion and then leave!”_

_“She needs a lesson?!” Courfeyrac asked, speechless. “She’s taken disciplinary measures against you because you handed out those gastronomic bombs you’d taken with you!”_

_“Michel Combeferre! It was just a prank! And besides you should thank me for having spared you!”_

_“For goodness’s sake, you frosted those doughnuts with mayonnaise on purpose! That was a despicable deed from you, François De Courfeyrac!”_

_“Now look here!” Courfeyrac got irritated. “You know I loathe being called by my full surname! Too pretentious!”_

_“You come from one of the few noble families left in France: it seems more than appropriate to me.”_

_At that time, Combeferre and Courfeyrac were in the same class: from day one of the year before they had always been together, basically inseparable. Combeferre had always been rather shy, while Courfeyrac glided among people as if it were the easiest thing in the world; equally, Courfeyrac could stay focused for no more than ten minutes, while Combeferre got distracted only on exceptional occasions. The two boys had a lot to learn from each another and they couldn’t get along better. They were also physically different: Combeferre was a little more plumpy than he would’ve become later and he still wore prescription glasses, while Courfeyrac was rather slim._

_“I’m going in!” Courfeyrac insisted. He then threw his schoolbag straight into Combeferre’s arms saying, “Hold my bag for me – at least it won’t be in my way.”_

_“Forget it!” Combeferre handed the bag, which was full of books, back to him. Keeping his hand pressed on Courfeyrac’s bag, he added, “I don’t want to take part in any of this!”_

_When Combeferre seemed to be about to go away, Courfeyrac stopped him. “Come on, you’re here now anyway! Don’t spoil everything!” Courfeyrac answered, flinging the bag to his friend once more._

_“NO!” They kept throwing that poor schoolbag to and fro for a while as Combeferre distanced himself more and more from Courfeyrac, trying to get away._

_Suddenly Courfeyrac heard a very deep voice say, “Hey, what’s going on here?” For fear of having been caught by a professor, a panicking Courfeyrac turned around abruptly and threw the schoolbag in the direction of that sound. Unfortunately the bag ended hit the stomach of a tall sturdy boy, who kept his brown hair long on top and shaved on the sides; he was passing by with another leaner boy, slightly shorter than him, with thick black curls and light blue eyes._

_“Oh fuck… I’m sorry!” Courfeyrac said as he saw that boy touching his abdomen. “You frightened me, and-”_

_“Yvan, you alright?” the shorter boy said placing a hand on his friend’s shoulder._

_“Yvan?” Combeferre asked in shock, as if he knew him. “Yvan Bahorel?”_

_“Do you know him?” Courfeyrac asked, turning to him._

_“Only by name…” Combeferre admitted. “He’s quite renown here in school because he flunked  two years in a row…”_

_“Exactly!” Bahorel confirmed, giving his own schoolbag to his friend without turning around. While walking towards Courfeyrac, he cracked his fingers and added, “And considering the fact that I didn’t flunk because of my grades only… I’d say you can start worrying of having provoked the wrong guy!” That said, he grabbed Courfeyrac by his shirt and lifted him from the ground. “Where do you want me to start?”_

_“Pl-please put him down…” Combeferre tried to say. “It was an accident!”_

_“You stay out of this, or it’s gonna be your turn later!” Bahorel said without averting his gaze from Courfeyrac._

_“Eheh… can’t we just talk about this?” Courfeyrac said, trying to get himself out of trouble._

_“Obviously not!”_

_“Yvan, come on!” The other boy looked like he wanted to help Courfeyrac, yet he was keeping to himself. “Can’t you just drop it for once?”_

_“Don’t you start, too, Georges!” It seemed that Bahorel didn’t want to listen to reason._

_“HEY! PUT HIM DOWN NOW!” The four boys turned around hearing these words pronounced by a still high-pitched male voice. In front of them and behind Bahorel’s back two boys had appeared, one in front of the other: seeing how they were small and still quite short, Courfeyrac had the feeling they were younger than him and Combeferre, therefore they probably were at their first year. The boy at the back showed dishevelled red hair and he was really small, since he managed to almost disappear behind his friend – slightly taller than him, slender and with blond hair long enough to be tied in a low little ponytail. Looking at them, it was plain that it had been the boy in the front who’d shouted out. Courfeyrac felt something move, he turned around and noticed Bahorel who had turned a little towards the kids, glancing the blond one from top to toe, while his black-, curly-haired friend was looking at that small kid too with a surprised and gaping gaze._

_“You got a problem with me, kid?” Bahorel said, staring into the young boy’s big, light blue eyes._

_“You see someone else around here?!” he retorted, resolutely moving forward. The other boy stayed back for a moment, then running immediately behind his friend’s shoulders again as if to hide._

_“N-no, wait…” Combeferre uttered to the blond. “You don’t have to get into trouble for us…”_

_“Leave it, know-it-all!” Bahorel said, putting Courfeyrac back on the ground and marching in turn towards the kid. “Clearly someone here feels like playing the hero!”_

_The boy stared on at him from below without stepping back. Seeing them one in front of the other, Courfeyrac noticed that, yes, that kid was really minute; Bahorel was so tall that he towered over Courfeyrac head-and-shoulders, but the blond boy was tall just enough to reach halfway through Bahorel’s chest with his head. Besides, Bahorel was quite sturdy; by contrast, he was as slender as a willow. And yet he looked like he felt no fear at all. “Just because you’re bigger and older than me it doesn’t mean I should be afraid of you!” He then turned his head towards the boy frozen behind him and told him, “Jean, step back, please. I wouldn’t want you to take part in this!” Combeferre put a hand on Jehan’s shoulder (Jehan would’ve been his nickname), managing to make him go beside him. The other boy looked at Combeferre in surprise, then giving a nod with his head in gratitude._

_“Is being such a hero a habit of yours, little brat?” Bahorel said, lifting him up by the jeans shirt he was wearing. The blond kid was so light he needed one hand only._

_“Come on, Yvan... let him be...” the black-, curly-haired boy who was with him said, placing a hand on his shoulder as if he wanted to stop him. “He has nothing to do with what has happened...” He was trying to convince him to drop it, almost as if he wanted to protect the blond kid, but Bahorel wasn’t listening to reason._

_It was then that Courfeyrac thought to create a diversion by throwing the stink bomb into the chemistry lab. It worked, apparently, because everyone rushedly held his nose: doing so, Bahorel let go and the blond kid fell to the ground._

_“Are you hurt?!” Combeferre said running to him with Jehan in tow._

_“No, I’m fine...” the boy said, massaging his bottom. “Gee... what a fucking smell...”_

_At some point, while Courfeyrac and Combeferre were helping the blond get on his feet, out of the laboratory and coughing came two boys. The first to come out had black hair covered by a blue bandana and he was holding by the hand the other boy, slimmer and probably younger, sporting thick brown hair and a pair of small green eyes._

_“*Coff coff!* Can’t one even stay quietly in the lab?!” the boy with the bandana said. “You alright, Hervé?”_

_“*Coff* Not really... *coff coff coff* I feel like I’m suffocating!” he answered trying to catch his breath._

_The other boy placed an arm around his shoulders and arranged him in a standing position so that he could breathe more easily. Then he looked at the others and said, “What have we ever done to you?!”_

_“Forgive me! I...” Courfeyrac began to say, feeling very guilty. “I didn’t suppose there was someone in there!"_

_“What’s this unbearable stench?!” All the boys turned towards the source of that deep voice: professor Javert, briefcase in hand, was passing by while heading home and he’d stopped to check what was going on, having become suspicious because of the smell coming out of the classroom. “Monsieur Bahorel! I should’ve guessed you were behind all of this!”_

_“No, professor! Wait!” Bahorel started to speak. “This time I’m not-”_

_“Why! There is also monsieur De Courfeyrac!” Javert interrupted him, spotting the curly-haired boy among the group. “Yes... I recognize your unmistakable personal touch!” He then looked at all the other boys. “Who do we have here, now?”_

_Courfeyrac was feeling guilty and he tried to explain everything to the deputy headmaster. “No, just a moment, professor. It was my idea, they don’t...”_

_Once more Javert spoke without listening to what he had to say. “Here’s monsieur Grantaire too. By following monsieur Bahorel around, you’re going to take a bad path. I thought your habit of constantly being late to class was sufficient to you.” Grantaire lowered his gaze and Javert went on. “Same for you, monsieur Combeferre. You’re one of the brightest in this insitiute, why look for trouble?” Courfeyrac wanted to defend his friend but Javert didn’t give him the time to do that. “Monsieur Lesgle, monsieur Joly... you two have never caused trouble... but it’s said that there’s a first time for everything !”_

_Lesgle, later nicknamed Bossuet, immediately piped up, “Now wait a minute! We haven’t done anything! We were just...”_

_“Hold it, René!” Joly whispered to him. “We shouldn’t have been there after class: please don’t make it worse!”_

_Probably Javert didn’t hear them as he immediately turned to Jehan. “Monsieur Prouvaire... never would I have thought that a student like you could let himself get involved in such hooliganism as this... what a shame...” Jehan lowered his gaze immediately; he looked like he was about to cry, but he didn’t. “And you, monsieur Enjolras.” As soon as he heard his name, Enjolras looked up towards the professor, staring straight into his eyes, unashamed. “You have just arrived here, yet I already had to reprimand you for an unjustified absence and now for this… not bad, for your first day!” Courfeyrac noticed that suddenly Enjolras had clouded over. How could a scolding have made him so sad?_

_Javert lifted his gaze from the boys and directed it to the lab. “Let us verify the damage, now.” He entered the room bursting the door open. Courfeyrac could see some huge purple spots covering the snow-white counters tiles – he had managed to add paint inside the stink bomb. Combeferre looked shocked and enraged when he saw the colour spread everywhere._

_“Well, well”, Javert said unperturbed. Right then a boy pushing a janitor cart happened to pass by; he had black curly hair and was wearing blue heavy overalls. As he saw him, Javert said, “This seems to suggest me a convenient punishment for you. Monsieur Feuilly!”_

_Feuilly lifted his eyes from the floor he’d been cleaning and headed towards them, looking surprised. “Good afternoon, professor Javert. How can I help you?”_

_“I would need a favour”, the deputy headmaster told him. “These boys are to stay here until the laboratory is perfectly clean!”_

_Feuilly glanced quickly at them, meeting Courfeyrac’s eyes. “François?”_

_Courfeyrac lifted his hand shyly and said in a guilty voice, “Hello, Gabriel…”_

_“Have you two met?” Combeferre asked in surprise._

_Courfeyrac didn’t avert his embarrassed eyes from Feuilly as he answered, “Yeah… we share the same room!”_

_Javert explained on, “Please give them the necessary equipment and watch over them until they’re through.”_

_Feuilly looked shocked by Javert’s request. “Pardon me, what?”_

_The first minutes of punishment went by completely in silence: all the boys were too mad to speak to each other. Courfeyrac was looking for a way to relieve the tension; he didn’t know what to do, though. He glanced around, looking at the other boys working silently, each one keeping to himself. Bahorel was cleaning the closest counter to the door with Grantaire, who looked like he had other thoughts on his mind and from time to time he lifted his gaze towards the window; however, Courfeyrac couldn’t tell for sure what he was looking at. Joly and Bossuet were at the counter beside theirs, now and then talking softly; Courfeyrac had the impression that the boy with the bandana had been keeping a strange behaviour, as if he liked the other boy, but he wasn’t sure of that. Enjolras and Jehan were at the counter next to the window, occasionally talking: the red-haired boy looked mortified for what had happened and the blond one was trying to cheer him up, although he too didn’t exactly look like he was happy. Combeferre was cleaning the counter beside that one with Courfeyrac, still completely silent: the curly-haired boy saw that he was still pretty mad. Feuilly, annoyed, was monitoring the boys’ work trying nonetheless to help them, so to be over with it more quickly._

_Having analysed the situation, Courfeyrac thought that, in order to relieve the tension, he had to act on Combeferre first. He grabbed the old skeleton next to the blackboard and he approached him. “Micheeeeel!”_

_Combeferre stopped scrubbing the counter with the kitchen sponge. Courfeyrac only needed a quick look to grasp that he was angrier than he’d expected. “What?” Combeferre said in an annoyed tone without looking at him._

_“Are you really this mad at me?” Courfeyrac had grabbed the skeleton’s bony wrists, gesturing with them in front of his friend and looking at him through the ribcage._

_“You don’t say!” Combeferre lifted his eyes. Whatever he was about to say never left his mouth; the sight of the skeleton had left him speechless. It took him a few seconds to start talking again. “What are you doing?”_

_“Trying to cheer you up!” Courfeyrac was still gesturing with that poor mass of bones._

_Combeferre looked at him for a moment before adding, “I got into trouble because of you and the year’s started just a week ago! All of this because you won’t listen either to me or your common sense! How do you suppose to make me feel better, pray?”_

_Courfeyrac had to think about it for a moment. He looked at the skeleton and said, “Look: he’s in a far worse state than you!” Courfeyrac realized everyone had turned towards them, hearing that absurd conversation. Combeferre didn’t answer, so the curly-haired boy didn’t let himself be distracted and went on, “He’s all bony, old, stained and crumbling! Not to mention he happens to be in my hands and this could cause his untimely end! You’re definitely in a better state than him.”_

_Combeferre almost felt like laughing. He smiled, shaking his head and saying, “Well… I’m not bony, old or crumbling. I’m in a better state only because of these reasons!”_

_“I’ve tried to stain you, but I’ve never manoeuvred you like a puppet!” Courfeyrac said in his defence._

_“Not yet!” Combeferre corrected him. Courfeyrac felt relieved as he’d managed to make at least Combeferre smile. He looked around to see on whom he would’ve worked then, and he noticed Feuilly was already laughing. The boy with the bandana and the blue-eyed, curly-haired one looked amused too, so he thought to start with one of them. Then he realized he hadn’t caught everyone’s attention as he had believed before. The blond boy had his eyes fixed on the sponge, yet he wasn’t cleaning: he was just looking absent-mindedly towards his hand, his gaze full of sadness. Courfeyrac then decided to work on him: he didn’t know him, and nevertheless he felt sad seeing that beautiful, still childlike face so disheartened._

_“What about you, blondie?” he said, coming beside him with the skeleton. Enjolras turned around and his big sad eyes filled with bewilderment. “Come on, don’t pull that pouty face!” Courfeyrac grabbed the skeleton’s hands and put them on Enjolras’s cheeks, close to the corners of his mouth. Before Enjolras said anything, Courfeyrac added, “Let’s change that awful frown into a… beaming smile!” That said, he pushed the skeletal hands upwards, therefore pulling up the sides of Enjolras’s mouth._

_The blond boy stared at him with even more bewilderment because of what had happened, in the deadly silence fallen onto the lab. But then he looked at Courfeyrac and he started to smile: somehow his plan had worked._

_“There! Such a pretty smile!” Courfeyrac said removing the hands from the boy’s face. He then turned around and saw that everybody was smiling, looking at the blond boy’s face. “See? You have such a pretty smile that everybody’s smiling too!” Enjolras let out an almost embarrassed laugh, and Courfeyrac started to give voice to the skeleton, talking nonsense of any kind and, by that, relieving the tension; he spent a little time with everybody, trying to make them laugh to break the ice. His plan went swimmingly: even Bahorel looked like he’d let himself go, smiling and laughing. He and Bossuet joined Courfeyrac and they started to play with that old pile of bones, using him as a dance partner._

_Courfeyrac then came back to Enjolras and pulled the skeleton’s hand forward, saying, “My name is François Courfeyrac! What’s yours?”_

_“You really want me to shake hands with the skeleton?”_

_“I don’t. It’s this all-bones thing who’s being rude and precedes me!” Courfeyrac said glaring into the carcass’s eye sockets and laying it aside. Enjolras laughed as Courfeyrac held out his hand to introduce himself properly. “Enjolras, right?”_

_“Yeah, exactly”, Enjolras said shaking his hand. “Didn’t the professor call you ‘De Courfeyrac’, though?”_

_“Yes… That would be my surname, but I don’t like it… too noble!”_

_“De Courfeyrac?” Courfeyrac turned around: Bahorel had butted in. “So you come from one of the few noble families left in France!”_

_“Yup!” Courfeyrac admitted, not knowing whether to be proud or ashamed of it: he didn’t like boasting his noble origins. “Generally I’d rather people weren’t aware of that, but since you are…”_

_“Wow…” Bossuet said, sounding enthusiastic. “We have a blue-blooded in our school!”_

_Courfeyrac got embarrassed, then, since the initial tension had faded, he said, “What about you? Don’t leave me to be the only one to talk!”_

_“‘We’ what?” Bossuet said, going back to sit on one of the lab stools beside Joly._

_“It’d be nice to introduce ourselves. We’re all here anyway, and we’ve just stopped playing the fools together!” Courfeyrac said, moving to be onto the counter beside the one Enjolras and Jehan were cleaning so to be able to look at everyone in the eye. Nobody spoke, so he went to Combeferre, placing himself behind him and, pushing on his cheeks, he made his mouth move, trying to mimic his sweet voice and saying, “I am Michel Combeferre, the school’s know-it-owl-est! François and I are in our second year! How do you do!”_

_His mouth still a little squashed and his face red out of discomfort, Combeferre said, “Would you please leave my face in peace?”_

_“I’m in my second year too!” a still high-pitched voice uttered from the end of the classroom. Joly had spoken without realizing it._

_“Are you?” Courfeyrac exclaimed in surprise. Joly nodded lightly, discomforted by the other boys’ looks._

_Combeferre noticed that and he butted in, “It makes sense that we’ve never met: there are so many sections in this school!”_

_“What’s your name?” Courfeyrac said._

_Joly couldn’t answer, so it was up to Bossuet introducing the both of them. “He’s Hervé Joly. I’m René Lesgle, first year of poli-sci.”_

_“Do you really study political science?” Enjolras said: his attention had probably been roused. Bossuet answered with a nod._

_“I do too, and it’s like an atrocious torture!” Bahorel said, leaning on his elbow. There were some moments of silence from which Bahorel evidently assumed that the others were expecting an introduction, so he added, “Yvan Bahorel, first and – if I flunk again – last year of poli-sci!”_

_“Don’t say that! I intended to apply for poli-sci next year!” Courfeyrac said, impressed by Bahorel’s opinion._

_“I don’t think it’s so bad!” Bossuet said to try to cheer Courfeyrac up._

_“That’s because you’ve just started! I’ve been held back for the fucking third time now; believe me when I say I know it better than you!”_

_“The third time?!” Feuilly let the words slip out of his mouth. “I thought you were my age, but you’re a year older than me!” He had spoken, so now it was his turn to introduce himself. “Ah… uhm… I’m Gabriel Feuilly. In July I finished studying at the technical college and now here I am, working.”_

_“And you, red?” Courfeyrac told Jehan, approaching him. “What’s your name?” Jehan didn’t answer. He was apparently very shy because Courfeyrac hadn’t heard him talk yet – he didn’t even know what his voice sounded like. Jehan made to hide slightly behind Enjolras, but the blond encouraged him sweetly to come forward and introduce himself. However, Courfeyrac only heard a quick and very, very weak mumble._

_“Sorry, what did you say?” Bossuet asked. Courfeyrac then understood that he hadn’t been the only one not to have heard a thing of what that shy kid had said._

_Jehan managed to raise his voice a tad. “Jean Prouvaire… that’s my name… i-it’s my first year…”_

_“You’re the only one left!” Courfeyrac told Grantaire, who, however, seemed to be watching something else, his head leaning on a hand as he sat. Courfeyrac saw him looking in his direction, more or less, but he couldn’t understand what he’d been staring at. He then flung his arms randomly trying to enter his visual field, and he almost bumped Enjolras who had to stop chatting with Jehan to make sure not to be hit. “Heeeeeyyyyy?”_

_“Uh? What?” Grantaire snapped out of his trance, lifting his head. “Oh, sorry! I’m Georges Grantaire, first year of the art course.”_

_As introduction time was over, the boy started talking and getting to know each other while scrubbing the purple spots in the room away. From time to time Courfeyrac went back to talking to the skeleton and so he, Grantaire, Bahorel and Bossuet used it also as a lab coat model and even to sweep the floor. That afternoon changed something in all of them, without them noticing. They stayed there until 6.30 p.m. but that didn’t bother anyone. When it was time to go home they put a pair of protective glasses on the carcass’s skull and Courfeyrac thought it needed a name, since it was all thanks to it if they had bonded that afternoon. Much to everyone’s surprise the suggestion came from Jehan: out of his love for Shakespeare they called it Yorick. Going back home, they discovered that they were all lodging in the same student house and Enjolras was Combeferre’s new roommate._

_That evening, Feuilly offered to cook dinner for everybody. They were sitting and eating at the round table in the right corner of the common room when Grantaire, next to Enjolras, lifted his gaze to look at him; leaning with his elbows on the table, he moved forward, telling him, “What’s your name, blondie?”_

_Grantaire caught everyone’s attention. Enjolras looked at them, lost for some moments, then he told him, “I’ve already introduced myself at school, actually…”_

_“Yes, we know your surname’s Enjolras, but you must have a name, mustn’t you?” Grantaire said, leaning on the chair back. Enjolras looked like he almost didn’t want to answer, then he mustered something in a feeble voice. “Pardon?” Grantaire said, moving a little closer to him; Courfeyrac glanced at the others and he noticed that nobody had caught his name._

_Enjolras realized that and he said, “Sorry… It’s just that I can’t stand my first name…” He cleared his throat and added, “My name is Alexandre Enjolras.”_

_“Alexandre…” Grantaire said with a strange smile. “Sounds like a fine name to me. What’s wrong with it?”_

_“I don’t know, but… I never liked it. I’d almost rather being called by surname…”_

_“Right! Great idea!” Courfeyrac said, slapping a hand on the table. Everyone turned to him perplexedly, so he explained, “We could all call each other by surname. That’d be cool!”_

_“Why?” Combeferre asked._

_“Why not?” was Courfeyrac’s answer. Then he put an arm around Combeferre’s neck saying, “You and I sometimes already do that… Combeferre!”_

_“Georges and I do that too, actually”, Bahorel admitted, turning his gaze on the left where Grantaire was sitting._

_“It’d be strange… Joly… I have to get used to it, but I like your surname a lot, to tell the truth…” Bossuet said, looking at his right towards Joly. Courfeyrac watched them, his gaze going past Feuilly: once more, it seemed to him that Bossuet felt something stronger than friendship for Joly._

_“Jolllly”, escaped from Jehan’s lips._

_The tiny boy was sitting between Combeferre and Enjolras, yet Joly had heard him. “Pardon me, what?”_

_“Jolllly… so you may fly away on the four ‘L’s! [1]” Jehan answered very innocently._

_“Hey… I like it!” Bossuet said, placing an arm on Joly’s chair back._

_“You’d be Lesgle… I’m not convinced…” Joly said, turning to face him._

_“Your name sounds like L’Aigle. [2] Can we call you like that?” Courfeyrac said, suddenly enthusiastic. Bossuet didn’t look like he was eager to be called ‘The eagle’._

_“He’s no eagle of Meaux! [3]” Combeferre said. “He doesn’t need a nickname. Just use Lesgle, no?”_

_“You and your historic stuff nobody knows about!” Courfeyrac said, offended that Combeferre had turned his proposal down so brutally._

_“The eagle of Meaux? You mean_ _Jacques-Benigne Bossuet, the bishop of Digne?” Feuilly asked Combeferre, sticking his head out beyond Courfeyrac to look at him._

_“Yes… precisely”, Comebferre told him, happy that someone else was aware of that person’s existence. He then turned to Courfeyrac and told him, “See? I’m not the only one to know that.”_

_“Bossuet… Bossuet sounds cute!” Joly said distractedly; it looked like he hadn’t been following the conversation._

_Bossuet looked at him for a moment, saying after that, “Then you can call me Bossuet! After all he’s been looking for a nickname to give me, you weren’t convinced of Lesgle… Just call me Bossuet and it’ll be alright!” Joly stared at him, bewildered, giving Courfeyrac the proof he hadn’t been listening._

_“Good!” Courfeyrac said. He stood up and, pointing his finger to Enjolras, he said, “Then we have…” He got ready to go counter-clockwise to point at all the members of the new group, starting to list them. “_ _Enjolras, Grantaire, Bahorel, Bossuet, Joly, Feuilly, Courfeyrac – I don’t want to be called with that ‘De’ -, Combeferre and Prouvaire!”_

_“Oh no, please…” Jehan piped up. “Being called by surname’s very formal… I’d rather be called by name…”  
_

_“Well, if you like it better, we can call you Jean, no problem”, Enjolras told him calmly. “There’s no need to call you by surname, if you don’t want to.”_

_“Can you call me ‘Jehan’?” he asked looking at him._

_Everybody was silent and confused for a moment. Then Bahorel spoke up, “Why ‘Jehan’?”  
_

_“Because… the Middle Age is my favourite literary period… and in those days, my name was written and pronounced like that…”_

_There was another moment of silence which Courfeyrac didn’t grasp what it was due to – either the fact that no one understood how could Jehan know that or his extremely soft voice volume. Enjolras looked at them and said, “I don’t think anybody has anything against it, if you wish to be called like that.” The others had no objection._

_  
_

“So now you know how we met… and also why we call each other by surname.”

“Wow…” Marius uttered, speechless. “But how comes you didn’t notice you had been living in the same building?”

Courfeyrac answered straight away, “I suppose it depends on the fact that we lived on different floors.”

“My, my… what a weird coincidence…” Marius added. “And you still are so close…”

“Well, when we got to know each other we realized we have several interests in common”, Courfeyrac explained. “In particular, we all believe in Enjolras’s ideals. That’s why we see him as a kind of a leader.” He paused, then he felt like giggling as he concluded, “You also need to take into account his personality…”

“Courfeyrac! Marius! Shall we go?” Enjolras called them in a loud voice, as he and the other boys were already drifting towards the changing rooms.

“What was I saying?”

Once in the changing rooms, Enjolras retrieved his backpack and headed to one of the cubicles. Courfeyrac had noticed that his friend hadn’t locked the door and he decided to pull a prank on him before going back home. He silently got next to the door, gesturing at the others to keep quiet and he started singing under his breath Joe Cocker’s ‘ _You can leave your hat on_ ’. “ _Baby, take off your coat...”_ Then, suddenly – BANG – he quickly opened the door. _“Reeeeal slooow.”_

Enjolras blushed immediately and, after a moment of bewilderment, he slammed the door shut, yelling, “COURFEYRAC! WHAT THE FUCK!” Some moments of silence followed, in which Courfeyrac couldn’t get why Enjolras had had such an exaggerated reaction. He then heard Enjolras lock the door with the sliding bar, saying, “You can’t even trust your own friends!”

“Why? What did I do?” That said, he turned towards the others and he noticed they were staring at him in embarrassment, an appalled look in their eyes.

Bahorel, who was about to laugh out loud, averted his eyes from Grantaire, who in his turn was frozen on the spot, breathlessly gazing at the door, his face red; he gestured to Courfeyrac to have a look at the high, empty slot of space between the door and the ground. Courfeyrac took his advice and he noticed Enjolras’s swim shorts on the ground – the boy was slipping into his underwear just then.

“Oops…”

 

**_ \- End of chapter II- _ **

* * *

[1] Reference to the novel. During Joly’s description, Hugo writes, “[…] the result was an eccentric and agreeable being whom his comrades, who were prodigal of winged consonants, called Jolllly . "You may fly away on the four L's," Jean Prouvaire said to him”. ‘L’, in French, is pronounced ‘aile’, that is ‘wing’; therefore, ‘quatre ailes’ is ‘four wings’ and may become, once pronounced, ‘four L’s’.

[2] Reference to the novel. During Bossuet’s description, Hugo writes, “In this conclave of young heads, there was one bald member. The Marquis d'Avaray, whom Louis XVIII made a duke […], was wont to relate that in 1814, on his return to France, as the King was disembarking at Calais, a man handed him a petition. "What is your request?" said the King. "Sire, a post-office." "What is your name?" "L'Aigle." […] "Sire," resumed the man with the petition, "I had for ancestor a keeper of the hounds surnamed Lesgueules. This surname furnished my name. I am called Lesgueules, by contraction Lesgle, and by corruption l'Aigle." ”. ‘Aigle’, in French, means ‘eagle’, and ‘L’Aigle’ (the eagle) has the same pronunciation of Lesgle.

[3] Another reference to the novel. Hugo writes on, “Later on he [the King] gave the man the posting office of Meaux, either intentionally or accidentally. The bald member of the group was the son of this Lesgle, or Legle, and he signed himself, Legle (de Meaux). As an abbreviation, his companions called him Bossuet.” This is a reference to Jacques-Benigne Bossuet, who in 1682 became bishop of Meaux and who was later called ‘L’Aigle de Meaux’, that is ‘The Eagle of Meaux’.


End file.
